Fatsu Fatneel
by NaluKnight
Summary: Let's face it, my best friend was fat with a capital 'F'. And I don't mean that cute kind of chubby fat, I mean the "Oh my god it's a whale!" fat. His name was Natsu Dragneel, but he was better known to the general public as Fatsu Fatneel. But wait, three years removed where I don't see him and he's now a total hunk! And why do I keep blushing around him? What the hell is going on?
1. Prologue

**hey bitchasspussies, jk. This is just an idea that i got, and I realized it pretty recently and thought that it would make for an interesting story.**

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Let's face it, my best friend was fat. And I don't mean that cute kind of chubby fat, I mean the "Oh my god it's a whale!" fat. His name was Natsu Dragneel, but he was better known as Fatsu Fatneel. Some asshole back in the second grade or so gave it to him and the name just stuck. It wasn't his fault he had a low metabolism; no, it was his parents' fault because they never used to feed him right when he was a baby, so his metabolism got all fucked up, and he suffered the consequences. It never helped matters that he ate like a starved ape.

We actually met in pre-school and have been inseparable ever since. I just liked all of his different quirks and idiosyncrasies, no matter how he looked. Also, it might have been due to his shockingly, pink hair. He got stick for it from everybody else, but I loved the way it looked on the top of his head, one of his only redeeming physical features.

Later in life, we hit a spot of trouble, things were never what they seemed; it was pandemonium. I didn't know what to believe then, moving from one day to the next as if my life depended on it, and the center of all the outlandish and bizarre activity seemed to come from Natsu himself. Strange occurrences and midnight wanderings, dangerous secrets and forbidden information; really, he had pulled me into a precarious situation.

The story of the two of us is a long and complicated one, but then again, that's life for you. I honestly can't even remember the exact time or place, but the thing I'll always keep in my brain, and my heart, is the adventure he took me on.


	2. First Day

**'sup, I'll do replies to reviews at end of the chapter since I don't have that many right now anyway.**

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"Wake up Lucy! It's your first day of pre-school!" my mother belted harmoniously from downstairs. Her wake-up call had the effect of moving me from my peaceful slumber, as the rays filtered in through my window, they also seeped though my eyes and forced them open.

"Mmmmmhhaaaaagh" I groaned as I stretched my limbs; watching cartoons late into the night had not been a smart decision on my part, I was soooooo tired. Delaying getting up for another five minutes, I eventually dragged myself out of bed and started to brush my teeth. Today was my first day of pre-school, no more day-care for me; I'm a big girl now! Mama was possibly even more excited than me, and father couldn't care less, as usual. As for myself, I _was_ anticipating it, but then again I was a little nervous, it's not everyday that you start going to school, no matter the level.

I tied a pink ribbon in my hair after changing into a skirt and pink shirt to finish off my morning ritual (over the years it would get longer and longer) and proceeded to hop down the stairs. I was met by mama at the bottom, "Oh, there's my beautiful girl! Here let me fix your hair." and she immediately started to work her own magic on it. I always got embarrassed and flustered when she showed me affection and this time was no different.

"Ma-mama," I stuttered, "My hair's fine, there's no need to fix it." I said shyly, twirling my hair in my fingers.

"Oooh, you're just too cute when you're flustered." mama gushed. She moved in front of the mirror downstairs and began to stroke my hair with the skill of a veteran hairdresser. She really was a jack-of-all-trades, and I hoped to be like her one day. I definitely did _not_ want to be like my boring dad, I don't know _why_ mama ever fell in love with him. My father owned a huge conglomerate specializing in the fashion industry and it took a lot out of him. I once made him a nice snack and threw it away right in front of me! Mama said he was just stressed, but I still didn't understand why he had to be so mean all the time. Speaking of the big meanie, there he was right now, typing away at the computer doing who knows what.

I ventured a casual 'good morning' towards him, but he didn't even reply, typical. Mama gave me a knowing look that said don't bother him right now; it sometimes felt like that look was permanently etched onto her face. One of these days I was gonna beat my father up for being such a bully, but first I needed to actually gain some strength instead of looking like a stick.

With an expert flourish of of her hands, mama finished up with my hair and tugged my giggling self along with her to the kitchen; it was time for breakfast.

I usually liked to load up on pop-tarts and cinnamon rolls, but today mama said that I had to have a good breakfast. I grudgingly complied, but only because it was her and not someone else. She poured me a bowl of cheerios, which were surprisingly good, and I started to shove it into my mouth rather quickly; mama chuckled, "Slow down there sweetie, we still have plenty of time until we have to leave."

"I know, but I just want to finish this up fast." I replied.

In all it took me a good ten minutes to fit all that cereal into my small stomach, but I managed it. Mama, still chuckling, pulled me to the sink to wash up and then pulled me out the door with her. "Aren't we going in the car?" I asked, perplexed.

"Well, since today _is_ your first day, I thought that walking you to school would have given a nice twist to things." mama said. I nodded my acknowledgment to her statement; it would be special if she dropped me off herself, instead of sending me off with one of the servants. Usually whenever I wanted to go somewhere, father just boarded me up in the car with the chauffeur and it was boring. I didn't usually get to spend much time with mama outside the house.

The school I would be attending was called Sweet Apple Elementary, the closest primary school to me in the town of Magnolia. Normally it was only a good two minute drive by car, but the walk there took longer. I didn't mind, I used the time to chat with mama.

"Lucy dear, are you excited about making new friends?"

"I don't know, what if I don't make any?" I asked nervously. I had never had many friends before, actually scratch that, I had never had _any_ friends before. Most kids went to day-care before starting pre-school, but father insisted I did not and often hired help if mama couldn't take care of me herself. Therefore, I had no idea on how to make _a_ friend, much less _friends_.

"Nonsense, you're such a sweet girl, of course you will." mama assured me with a wave of her hand. She always made me feel better.

I was about to reply when I saw the familiar sign around the corner. "Hey mama, I think we've arrived."

"Hmm, yes we have. I'll walk you to the front and then you will be only your own; oh isn't this exciting!" mama exclaimed. More like nerve-wracking, I could barely stand on my own two feet. Mama coaxed me to the front of the school, where many others my age seemed to be. She shuffled me towards the entrance before swooping down to give me a quick hug and a kiss on the forehead. "Have a nice day at school Lucy honey." she uttered, before slowly turning and starting the trek back.

I waved until she was out of my sight. While starting to head towards the door, I heard a shout of, "NATSU, NO!" and before I knew it, I was splattered with a rather warm liquid. It was sticky and smelled rotten, and, was that a banana peel?! Oh dear god, I hadn't even taken a few steps and some idiot had sprayed me with vomit on the first day of school!

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 **there you go, and next chapter natsu, or should i say fatsu, will be introduced**

 **FT 451 chapter review:**

 **Finally we will see the dreaded right arm, and it looks like FT is ending soon, unless the actual main villain is anksheram and not zeref.**

 **Replies:**

 **Serpent Tailed Angel - yeah, in this story the name is given by small kids, so it will be more of a silly nickname/name-calling thing.**

 **Chocolatemmmmm- I updated**


	3. Vomit, Vomit Everywhere!

**And I'm back again!?#$%# feel free to pm anytime if you want to discuss, well, anything pretty much, just as long as it isn't toooo disturbing... On second thought i'll accept anything, have fun.**

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Wet. That is exactly how I felt at that moment, along with sticky, disgusting, warm, smelly, and a bunch of other words my 4 year-old self didn't even know. Food particles mixed with stomach fluids rippled down my skin and upper torso, leaving a stain trail as big as a lake down my top and my skirt. Rage and other eclectic emotions I had never felt before boiled within me like lava and I promptly turned around and nailed my assailant with the heel of my foot, "IDIOT!" As the poor boy, as I now saw, flew into the air from my kick, I caught a glimpse of pink and noticed that he was _incredibly_ fat. The boy had a scaly-white scarf around his fat neck. He came flying down with a booming 'THUD' and started to sorely rub his head, wincing all over.

I saw a tall, red-haired man approach me, and he looked like he was trying _very_ hard not to laugh, "Ahemm, uh, please excuse my idiotic son Natsu, if you haven't already noticed, he isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer." the man said with some trivial regret; seeing the confusion on my face, he introduced himself further, "Oh, by the way, I am his father, Igneel."

"Hello, my name is Lucy." I choked out; the smell of the vomit was getting to me. Igneel, noticing this, moved to his dazed son who was sitting on the ground. He sighed, before picking him and slapping his cheeks lightly, trying to get this Natsu boy to regain his senses.

"Eh, Natsu... come on, apologize to that little girl over there, you ruined her clothes and her hair after all." The boy named Natsu slowly stirred and started to come around, and then he sat up, clapping his hands to his cheeks.

"Who? You mean that weird girl who kicked me?" he asked, infuriating me.

"I'M NOT WEIRD! YOU'RE THE ONE WITH PINK HA-" I would have finished my sentence had I not noticed that the three of us had gathered a bit of a crowd. Igneel, noticing my hesitation, started to move the two of us towards the door.

"You two are better off finishing this inside, Natsu go with her to the nurse, she needs to get cleaned up and _you_ young man, need to get your head looked at." Igneel said sternly.

"But dad!" Natsu started.

"No buts, it was your fault her clothes are ruined, take responsibility." he said menacingly, causing Natsu to cower in fear; I snickered.

"Fine." Natsu pouted, before taking my hand out of nowhere and rushing me towards the nurse's office. Before I could even object, we were standing in front of the nurse's office, but she wasn't even ready yet, so we had to wait in the lounge. The vomit squished and squirmed under my butt as I sat down, nauseating me even more. I wrenched my hand free from his, secretly glad that he now had some vomit on him too.

"Meanie." Natsu muttered quietly, though I heard.

"What was that?!" I asked, flaring up immediately.

"I said you were a meanie, and you're weird too!" he said, anger quickly morphing his face.

"I'm the weird one?! Who's the one with pink hair?!" I yelled.

"Shut up it's salmon!" he yelled back, clearly frustrated. Both of us were seething, breathing heavily due to our shouting match. Before either of us could take it any further, the door to the nurse's office opened and out walked a short woman, she didn't look older than a teenager, but there she was. She had golden-blonde hair that almost reached the ground in wavy curls.

"Hello, my name is Mavis an-" She stopped when her eyes came upon the two of us trying to strangle each other. "Whoa, woah! What's happened here?!" she exclaimed, while prying the two of us apart.

"This weirdo blondie is being suuuuper mean to me!"

"This pink-haired buffoon vomited his breakfast all over me." I said, shaking my sopping wet clothes in Mavis's direction. To my great ire, the nurse had a comical look on her face, and I could tell she was trying her best not to laugh out loud.

"Well then, could you tell me how this happened...?" she said looking kindly at us for our names.

"It's Lucy and this idiot is named Natsu, what happened was that _I_ was innocently making my way to the front door, when pinkie here threw up all over me." As I said it Natsu slapped my head in irritation, which made me kick him in the shins. Before long, we were rolling around on the ground, trying to beat each other up as much as possible. It was harder for me than it was for him, everywhere I punched, he didn't seem to feel a thing, it only made ripples on his skin. Unfortunately, Mavis stepped in once again, tearing us apart on more.

"Now that's enough you too." she said sternly, but not unkindly, "Now Natsu, tell me, why did you throw up all over sweet Lucy here?" Mavis inquired.

"I had just gotten out of the car and I had to hurl, it's not my fault I have major motion sickness!" Natsu insisted, waving his flabby arms around for emphasis. Both mine and Mavis's eyes bugged out at this piece of information.

"EEEEEEHHHHHH!"

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 **Don't expect updates this fast normally, I was bored today**

 **replies: (i won't reply to anon who don't put a name, because that's just a hassle to identify you guys)**

 **banana-mana- cool name, and thank you for the feedback**


	4. Second Time's the Charm, Or Not

**Here is the next chapter, I am just really bored right now, Ive never chugged out chapters this fast! Feel free to PM about anything, and anyone who had followed this story, please leave a review, I would really appreciate it, thanks!**

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"EEEEHHHHH!"

"What do you mean you have motion sickness!" I cried. I had heard of people getting sick when riding something scary before, something like a rollercoaster. Never had I up until that point seen anyone who got sick simply from riding in a _car_! Mavis looked equally stunned next to me, her big eyes impossibly wide. However, she regained her composure rather quickly.

"Now, Natsu, I'm sure your motion sickness can't be _that_ bad." she tried in a kind voice.

"Oh trust me, it is." he insisted with a wave of his arms, causing his scarf to shake. Mavis looked unconvinced, so she motioned for him to step onto the large medical bed in the middle of the room; it had wheels on it, though the stupid dunce didn't notice. He waddled over to the bed and clambered onto it, making squishy noises as he did. Oh yeah, when we had rolled around fighting, he had probably been smeared with puke too. I would have cackled, but the thought of having his _own_ vomit all over himself made me even _more_ nauseated than before, if that was even possible.

"There, isn't that more comfortable?" Mavis asked Natsu. He nodded, laying his head back onto the pillow. Mavis snuck up behind him and gave the bed a little nudge. At first nothing happened, and the two of us sighed in relief, but then, we saw Natsu's face go pale, and then green; he hurled again at, you guessed it, me. The utter shock of it took a little time to hit me, but as soon as it did, it hit hard.

At that point I was too disgusted and tired to do anything, so I simply started sobbing with self-pity (what? I _was_ four at the time). Mavis came over to comfort me, and said that I could vomit on her to even out the score since it had technically been _her_ fault.

Her efforts at pacifying me sort of worked. As Natsu was still passed out on the bed, she took me to the wash and instructed me to clean myself. Once done, she found some clothes for me, "There you go honey, those should work for you just fine." she said, handing me some elastic pants and a green T-shirt. Not the best outfit, but I'd rather it be that than anything covered in _double_ puke.

"There, there sweetie, at least now you're nice and clean." Mavis cajoled, trying to cheer me up some more. "Why don't we go on over to your classroom Lucy? You'll get a chance to meet the teacher and make some new friends?" I nodded to her and she led me to a class that had, Ms. Spetto, on the front. We went inside to find a decent amount of kids milling around and playing. In the middle was a short, middle-aged woman with dark hair. As soon as she saw me and Mavis, she let out a smile.

"And who is this little angel?" she gushed, coming over to inspect me.

"This is Lucy, she got held up a bit but she's in your class Ms. Spetto." Mavis answered for me.

"Well, well, come along now dear, there's lots to do around here after all." Spetto said warmly, dragging me gently to a little table. Mavis left saying something about checking up on Natsu, but I didn't actually hear her. Ms. Spetto was very kind, letting me draw in a coloring book she had just taken out, and I enjoyed myself for the next ten minutes or so. I heard the door click and happily raised my head up to see who the newcomer was, when I saw pink and gasped. He had the same expression as I did etched onto his face.

"YOU!" we both shouted while pointing our hands at each other.

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 **Well there you are**

 **replies:**

 **banana-mana- yes they were still in vomit**

 **Doom marine 54- thank you very much**

 **Gh0st's Buddy- yeah i tried to think up something pretty bad for their meeting.**


	5. Juvenile Regret

**Wow, I really am updating fast aren't I! Please leave a review, thank you!**

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"YOU!"

Our combined outburst reverberated across the room. It alerted most of the other kids, who stopped what they were doing just to peer at the two of us; we were still pointing stupidly at one another of course. The two of us still hadn't noticed the lack of activity however, as we were just standing there, glaring at each other. Ms. Spetto soon noticed the tension and tried to relieve it, "Hello, what's your name sweetie?"

Natsu stopped glaring at me for a moment, "Oh, I'm Natsu."

"Pleasure to meet you Natsu, now can you tell me why you and Lucy here shouted at each other so loudly?" Ms. Spetto asked amiably, trying to settle him down; it didn't work.

"Well that meanie over there kicked me sky-high and then she started to fight me!" he accused, causing my temper to once again increase.

"I wouldn't have done any of that if you knew how to keep your breakfast in your stomach!" I shouted back, causing Ms. Spetto to flinch a little; oh well, there went her good impression of me.

"Not my fault I have motion sickness!" he defended, hands in his pockets as he sunk into his scarf. Little did we know, our little spat had attracted the attention of the whole class now, and they were silently laughing at how fat Natsu was (since I had never really been around others my age too much, I did not then know how unintentionally cruel young kids could be to each other).

"You could've at least said sorry to me!" I cried shrilly, unaware of the crowd; Ms. Spetto looked too scared to do anything (she was a gentle lady).

"You're too weird to say sorry to!" Natsu yelled, pushing me over the edge.

"Well at least I'm not a fatty who vomits on everyone!" I ejaculated triumphantly, but I regretted it as soon as I saw the flash of hurt in his eyes. He looked a bit lost, as if he didn't know how to retaliate; I myself was a bit shocked I had said such a thing, but the bubbling of laughter all around caught both of our attentions. Most of the kids were laughing while holding stitches in their sides, pointing at Natsu and making fun of him. There were shouts of "fatty" and "fathead" and dozens of other hurtful names.

Mama had taught me better than to make fun of someone's appearance, and here I was instigating it; I felt awful. I could see Natsu trying to stop the other kids from saying anything, but it was too contagious. I was about to go and apologize to him, when he turned and ran, light tears falling from his face, through the door.

The laughter in the class died down after Ms. Spetto started shushing them up, and I was still standing there, looking at the door, hoping he would come back, but he didn't. "It's going to be okay honey," she told me while patting my back, "I'm sure you didn't mean it." she said, seeing the regret on my face. I simply nodded, still in disbelief at what I had done.

As much as he had annoyed me that day, I still couldn't help but feel some sort of _connection_ when talking to him, as if I had known him before, and I think he felt the same way. After all I _had_ wanted to make a friend that day, but instead I had sent a potential one running.

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 **Here's chapter 5, it might be another couple chapters until the two tie the knot of** **friendship.**

 **So, since anything romantic between nalu won't happen until three-year timeskip which is later on, there will be some potential "love rivals" as Juvia might put it, and I would ask that you please leave a review or PM me on who you guys would prefer most for those guys to be, thank you!**

 **r** **eplies:**

 **Gh0st's Buddy: oh yeah, it went down alright**

 **Seira Mikalle- yeah and thank you; the timeskip won't be for a while yet, Ive got to get though a good bit of plot first!**


	6. Resolution

**So if any of you want to suggest potential "love rivals" please go ahead. R &R!**

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For the rest of my first day of school, I somberly made my way across the classroom, just drifting into one activity after another. I wasn't really aware of much around me. A few people actually came and talked to me, mainly asking about Natsu, but I shot them down pretty quickly; there was one who stood out though. She had long, white hair that was in bangs with a blue band in it, accompanied by a pretty pale face. She smirked as she walked up to me, devious delight already lighting up her small eyes, "Hello, you're Lucy aren't you? I'm Sorano, I just wanted to say that I thought what you did earlier was pretty funny." she said, laughing.

I raised me eyebrows a bit, "No... that was a mistake, I-I shouldn't have done it." I said quietly, still in my own little world. In truth I must have sounded pretty pathetic, because she started backing up after that, as if she found me a bit strange.

"Well, whatever... just, yeah." she finished rather lamely, as she went back to her friends. I saw that she was with another girl who also had white hair, except her's was short, but her face looked very much alike to Sorano's. She looked kind, laughing with her friends... I wish I had friends, but the whole ordeal from before had made me a bit down. I decided to tell mama about it and listen to her advice.

School ended without any incident, and Natsu never came back; I suppose he went home early. Mama was smiling at the entrance of the school when I walked outside, looking very proud of me, "There you are sweetie, how was your first day of school?"

"Ok." I answered evasively; I didn't want to have this conversation until we got home. Mama knowingly took my hand and led me to the parked car, and we drove him shortly after.

As soon as we got home, she marched me out of the car and up to my room, carefully guiding me. Once in, she bade me to sit on the bed, and turned around to look at me, "Alright, spill honey. You haven't been yourself since I picked you up, so something must be bothering you."

I nodded a bit and sighed out, knowing what I had to say; it was now or never, "Well, today at school, remember when you dropped me off right?" mama nodded, "Well after that I was about to go inside, when this kid threw up on m-" mama started laughing; why did everyone think it was funny?!

"It's not funny mama!" I whined, "It got all over me!"

"Now I know why you aren't wearing the dress from the morning," she said, "it was ruined immediately!" she finished, still giggling slightly. I huffed in irritation, and mama stopped laughing, though she was still hiccuping a bit. "So is that why you're quiet dear? Because you got vomited on?"

"No..., after that me and the same kid got into a fight in the classroom, and... I kind of insulted him in front of everyone." I said hesitantly, and then quickly added, "I didn't mean to, it just sort of came out, and before I could do anything else, he ran away!"

Mama was more serious now, "Lucy... what did you say dear?" her tone made me feel ashamed.

"I-I kinda called him.. fat." and as I said it, I saw disappointment flood mama's features. She shook her head and sighed, and then proceeded to come up to the bed and sit beside me. She put a hand on my lap.

"Lucy honey, I know I taught you better than this."

I nodded in agreement, "I didn't mean it, I just couldn't stop myself!"

Mama sighed again, "Well, I hope you know what you have to do now." she said matter-of-factly.

I huffed a bit, "You want me to go and apologize, I know. But, what if he doesn't forgive me?" It would have been bad if I had made an enemy on the first day of school.

"I'm sure if you act sincere, he will forgive you, after all, from your story, it seems that both of you are at fault in one way or another." Mama said knowingly. I sheepishly twirled my hair while looking down. It had _technically_ been Natsu's fault at first, but then again I was also pretty guilty for having a quick temper.

"I guess so, and... I really _did_ feel bad about it, I just can't get it out of my head." I admitted.

Mama laughed again, this time lightly, "Well, at least we know that you feel guilty about it. The only remedy is to make peace with that boy."

"I will, I promise." I said, shaking my head up and down. Mama smiled and laid down on the bed, and shortly after I did the same. Two hours later the servants came up to find the two of us lightly napping on top of each other, smiles on our faces.

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 **Well there you have it, now I hope you guys enjoy! Please review, I enjoy reading them a lot!**

 **replies:**

 **NATSU- haha that's funny; fat natsu is actually my guilty pleasure!**

 **Gh0st's buddy- thx for the feedback PM!**

 **ell13- thank you for your kind words, i appreciate you reviewing.**


	7. Jelly Fat

**Wow, this story is gaining followers a lot faster than my other ones! I wonder why? R &R it makes my day!**

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The next day, I woke up more energized than ever before, a single goal in my head. It fueled me through my morning and breakfast. I didn't talk much, concentrating on what exactly I was gonna have to do. Mama gave me a meaningful look as she dropped me at school, and I gave her one back, acknowledging her wishes.

I took a deep breath and headed for my classroom, trying to compose myself as I went. Mama had always taught me to take deep breaths before trying to accomplish something important, and I knew that I had to do that now. When I got to the class, I peered for pink and after spotting it with some relief, I carefully trudged over to Natsu, not quite sure how to break the ice.

He was drawing something on a piece of paper (not coloring!) and though it first I didn't get it, I saw that he was drawing an incredibly detailed flame. It was all-consuming and licking at the corners of the pages like it would spring off of it at any moment. I saw an opportunity, "Hey that's really good." I complimented, trying to put as much honey into my voice as possible. His ears perked up, as if in shock that anyone was talking to him, and he whipped around in delight.

"Oh! Than-" his face fell when he saw me, and he turned back around, making it very clear he was not talking to me. I tried to make some small talk, anything just to make him react, but it was to no avail.

"Hey come on, I really meant it... your drawing is good." I said, trying to loosen him up, "And about yesterday I'm really so-" I didn't finish as he abruptly sprung up from his chair, causing a loud screeching noise, and strolled away, off to the other side of the classroom. He had a scowl on his face. Well that was a failure. Ms. Spetto looked like she wanted to say something, but then thought better of it.

The whole day I tried to get a chance to get close enough to Natsu to apologize, but each time he evaded me. It was very frustrating as I had started to feel more and more guilty about it, especially since many of the kids in the class were whispering behind his back and laughing at him.

By the time recess came around, I was really down in the dumps; Natsu had rejected all my advances and had still not said a single word to me, a stark difference from yesterday, when it seemed like he couldn't keep his mouth shut.

The whole class followed Ms. Spetto outside; it was a beautiful day, the sun was shining and the birds chirping. I once again tried to apologize, but Natsu just wandered off to nowhere. I sighed and, not wanting to waste a perfectly good recess, went to the jungle gym. It looked a lot bigger close-up and I got a little nervous climbing up the ladder. Once I got to the top of the structure, it felt as if I was on the top of the world, but not in a good way.

Gulping, I settled myself at the entrance of the slide, but was suddenly overcome by butterflies in my stomach. It was as if I couldn't move, rooted to the spot! The boy behind me, Bora I think was his name, had grown rather impatient with me, "Get a move on already you dumb girl!" but I couldn't hear him, too scared to notice anything. Snarling nastily, he gave me a push that caused me to yelp and tumble down the slide.

"Oooof." I landed awkwardly on the asphalt, a bit scraped. The rude boy came down right after, smirking. "You didn't have to push me you know!" I said angrily, picking myself up.

"Oh yeah, what are you going to do about it?" he asked, grabbing a rock on the ground in a threatening manner. My breath hitched, I hadn't meant for it to get violent. Bora was about to come after me, when a large mass landed on top of him from the slide, squishing him into the ground as if he were jello. His eyes bugged out as he cried, "AAAHH!"

Sighing with relief, I looked up to see my savior before my eyes widened; it was Natsu.

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 **There you are! two chapters in one day! I really have a lot of fun writing this story!**

 **manga talk:**

 **I feel like FT is ending soon, unless it pulls a Bleach. I wouldn't mind that at all, as long as it be handled in a better manner than Bleach, sort of like what HxH did with the dark continent; that would be cool.**

 **replies** **:**

 **Gh0st's buddy- of course he won't be brought down, that would be OOC!**

 **kat the neeko- Yeah sorry the chapters couldn't be longer, but since I try to update daily, they have to be short.**


	8. Reconciliation

**Here's the next chapter, on a side note, Ive been seeing a lot less cliche fanfics recently (lucy gets kicked off the team), so that's good**

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I blankly stared shamelessly at Natsu, who was trying not to meet my eye. Eventually, by the time the blush had covered his whole face, he finally had enough and said his first words to me that day, "WHAT?!" he snarled, or at least tried to, it came out more as a squeak. His shout shocked me out of my staring, and I rapidly fluttered my eyes. I hadn't expected him to help me out of all people, after all he wasn't speaking to me. His little action gave me hope that he would listen to me yet.

"Oh, um thank you." I said furtively, staring down at my shoes; this was harder than I thought, now that he was actually listening and not walking off, it was hard to take the initiative.

"Y-your welcome." he stuttered back, still not meeting my gaze. The two of us were acting pretty shy right now, after all, we hadn't actually had a conversation since yesterday, and that had been all shouting. Now that we weren't filed by reckless adrenaline, the ice was as unbroken as it could be. Fortunately for us, Bora startled us out of our nervousness.

"Hey, uuugh, um... don't mind me, but this little lover's spat would be better off happening when I'm, uuughhh, not being crushed like a tin can." he said, groaning out the last bit in pain. Natsu and I immediately jumped and blushed at his words, before Natsu quickly got off of him. Bora slowly picked himself up with a wheeze, "Wow.. sheesh, whaddya eat big guy?"

"None of your business." Natsu growled out, raising his hands threateningly.

"I was just wonderin-" Bora started with his hands raised defensively, before one look from me sent him packing. I smiled and turned back to Natsu, only to frown because he was wandering off towards the fence. I thought he would listen now?!

"Hey, wait up!" he turned at my voice, "I never got to thank you back there."

"Don't mention it." he said coldly, before turning back around. I was still not getting through to him; so I decided right then and there to just completely be honest with him and let it all out at once; there was now say he could ignore me then right?

"Listen, Natsu. I am really, really, _really_ sorry about yesterday. I have no right to call you names like that and I didn't mean it, it just sort of slipped out. I didn't realize that the whole class heard our argument, and I sincerely feel guilty about this whole mess, so please, forgive me." I finished with a high voice as I had sad everything at once. He stilled and kept his head down, staying like that for at least a minute. I patiently waited for him to respond, if he did at all. I wouldn't have blamed him if he didn't, I did after all make him the laughingstock of the whole class, and several of them had taken to start being mean to him: shoving, stealing food, just little things like that but they added up. I wanted to show him that there was at least one person still left in the class who wasn't a total meanie.

Finally, he turned back around, and, instead of the scowl I was expecting, he was wearing a brilliant smile, "Alright, I forgive you... you weirdo." he said. Without thinking, I flung my arms around his big back.

"Thank you so much!" I cried out, but then heard him chuckling. I pulled away, "What's so funny?"

"I will forgive you on one condition." he said mischievously, holding up a finger.

I gulped with apprehension, "And what would that be?"

"Push me on the swings!" he yelled gleefully, tearing towards them. I laughed too as I ran after him, intent on making it up to him. Later on in life, I would forget the exact sequence of events that had just passed, but it was at that moment that I became friends with Natsu Dragneel.

* * *

 **There we go**

 **replies:**

 **Gh0st's buddy- Natsu's arm will** **dragonize, i call it!**

 **NightmareTheFoxWitch- that won't be the last food reference**

 **Rose Tiger- of course, its in his nature!**


	9. Rollercoaster Swinging

**Thank you for reviewing so much last chapter, please keep them coming if you don't mind, i enjoy them! On another note, a lot of you would like to see longer** **chapters, I will try my best to make them longer, but be rest assured I am not going to hurry this story like some others i have seen before. The updates might not be daily if i make them longer, so i hope you guys don't mind!**

 **On another note, please leave a review if you want me to touch any other genres in this besides romance or humor, I know fic readers _love_ drama!**

 **P.S. if any of you like, drama, angst, or anything like that, you should check out my twoshot, "Without Him"**

 **UPDATE- do you guys want me to get to timeskip quicker or just go along with this pace?**

* * *

I _did_ end up pushing Natsu on the swings, but somewhere along the way, while his shouts of "higher, higher!" were in full flow, my arms simply gave way. No offense to him, but he was _literally_ a handful. Unfortunately for me, when he arrived on the backswing, I wasn't ready for it, so he and the swing promptly crashed into my tiny body (again, I was four people), causing me to be carried onto the swing with him.

"GAAAHHH! Natsu, you idiot!" I screamed, holding onto him for dear life. I wasn't exactly afraid, but it was my first time on one of those things. Mama didn't really take me to playgrounds much, preferring things that she and I could do together. Natsu only noticed me after I had screamed in his ear.

"Lucy?! If you wanted a turn, you should have waited!" he yelled, oblivious to the situation. I rolled my eyes as best I could while swinging through the air. The collision somehow actually caused the force of our swinging to increase, and the swing was going higher and higher each time. We were both screaming as if we were on a rollercoaster, hugging each other for dear life.

"Natsu if we get out of this alive, I'm gonna kill you!" I shouted in his face, closing my eyes.

"You'll have to catch me first you meanie!" he yelled back.

Faster and faster, higher and higher; the swing was going out of control. But this time, it felt as if it was going to swing 360 all the way around. As we reached the vertex of the swing, time seemed to slow down as we teared back around. The wind whipped through the hair on both of our faces, ruining mama's morning ministrations to my locks. I could feel Natsu's grip on the chain loosening, his hands positively _dripping_ with sweat now; he had been holding it as tight as a corkscrew for the past few minutes after all.

The wind screamed in my ear as we swung up, and Natsu's hands finally lost the battle, not being able to hold on anymore. There was a chinking sound as his hands were ripped from the chains, "Oh man, I don't think I can hold on any longer!" and the next thing I knew we were flying, soaring through the air like speeding bullets. We were still clutching onto one another, screaming out heads off, "AAAAHHHHHHHHHH!"

The two of us flew high into the air, and then landed in a bush near the school building, "Ppfftt, yuck," I groaned, spitting leaves out of my mouth, "at least I landed on something soft." I said thankfully.

"Uuuggh, that something soft was _me_." Natsu groaned, easing me off of him, "Jeez Luigi, how much do you _weigh_?"

"IT'S LUCY! And you shouldn't be talking." I glared at him.

He huffed and wrapped his scarf around tighter, "Whatever, that was fun, let's do it again!" he bellowed out, grabbing my hand and dragging me towards the swings again before I could even process what he had said. Oh no, I was not getting on that deathtrap again; fortunately for me right at that moment, Ms. Spetto blew on her whistle, indicating that recess was over. I breathed out a sigh of relief as Natsu pouted, crossing his arms and muttering something about "too short" and "just getting started".

It was time for lunch as soon as we got back inside, today I finally had someone to sit with. Yesterday I had pathetically sat by myself, not feeling up to asking anyone if I could sit with them. It seemed that most of the kids in my class had gone to the same day-care as babies, "Oak Daycare", and so many of them already knew each other, not that I'm complaining; mama had raised me herself, even when father had insisted she send me to a care center. I always had fun when I was with mama, she was an angel in my eyes. As for father, let's just say he should have been happy that I hadn't label him a demon, yet.

Trailing Natsu to the back of the classroom, I followed his lead and plopped myself down on the cushions back there. They were _very_ soft and both Natsu and I giggled as we sunk further into the soft material. He took out his packed lunch and my eyes bugged out of my head as I took in the amount of food he had brought. There were about 3 sandwiches stuffed with an assortment of items as well as chips, soda, and candy. Natsu gleefully took each morsel out of his sack, and his eyes lit up when he glimpsed the last one, a ripe, roast chicken. Even my mouth watered at that.

Natsu dove into his lunch with a ravenous hunger, spraying bits of food everywhere, including me, "Ow, hey, Natsu, whoa.. could you _not_ get the food all over me? And how do you _eat_ that much?!"

"I have a big appetite." he said as if it were obvious, still swallowing exorbitant amounts of food down his throat. I sighed and opened my own pack; score! Mama had packed me my favorite snack! Muffins! I greedily ate them first, ignoring mama's constant warnings against eating dessert first. When I finished, I looked back... and there was nothing else?! Oh no! Mama _had_ seemed a bit distracted this morning, aacting very slow and somber; an image of a sandwich on the kitchen counter flashed through my mind. She must have forgotten to put my lunch in the pack! What was I going to do now?!

I frantically looked around, as if food would spring out of the ground; Natsu was still shoveling food into his mouth at an impressive rate. When I knew for sure I had no lunch, my stomach grumbled in hunger, in a sick bit of irony. I had never actually gone without a meal before; even sometimes when I claimed to mama that I absolutely _wasn't_ hungry, she still made me eat, "You're a growing girl sweetie, you need to eat." she would say with an air of kindness, but also with an underlying tone of disdane; she may have been my angel but she was also scary sometimes. She would get these fits of motherly affection and care that sometimes transformed her into an overprotective bear.

There was no hope for me, so I started to sniffle a bit, wallowing in self-pity (pathetic right?) when I caught Natsu's attention, "Lui- I mean Lucy, why aren't you eating? You're not worried about your weight again are you?" he asked.

"No.. idiot. I don't, sniff, have anything to eat." my voice cracked. He looked at me strangely for a second, and I couldn't tell what was going on through his head. Wordlessly he grabbed the roast chicken and gave it to me, a slight blush on his face, causing me to gasp with shock. I just stared at him, but he wasn't looking at me, avoiding my eye, so I dug in instead. It frightened me how fast I ate, but I was thankful nonetheless.

"Th-thank you Natsu." I stuttered.

"Don't mention it." he said simply, looking away, then added, "You don't always eat like a pig do you, you weirdo?"

I threw a cushion at him, "SAYS THE PIG HIMSELF!" I yelled. In hindsight I probably shouldn't have because that started a food fight that would get us both in trouble, but hey, that's what friends do.

* * *

 **There, a longer chapter! Please R &R, I enjoy receiving them!**

 **WARNING! DO NOT READ FOLLOWING PARAGRAPH UNLESS YOU WANT SPOILER OF CHAPTER 452:**

 **This chapter is called "Overture of the final battle" It looks like natsu's new right arm technique can only be used once, and this chapter introduces all of the** **spriggan and marin is still alive apparently. Meanwhile acnologia's arm that igneel tore off aches in preparation; all three sides are getting ready for war as zeref sends a force to invade ishgar. next chapter is called "The duty of a parent" there is also a color cover in this one.**

 **replies:**

 **Gh0st's buddy- oh it'll be a _long_ wait of a wait**

 **InTheLifeOfDrake- thank you, and I will certainly try**

 **Kat the Neeko- no problem, I didn't actually take offense to you're first comment, It's good you like the story enough that you want longer chapters!**

 **musicality82965- I did, and thank you for getting piqued**

 **sarafeena dragnee- did you mean to type in dragneel or dragnee? Either way, thank you! Your question is right after all, but that's still a while away, Ive gotta build some plot and backstory after all.**

 **Sabertooth7- thank you i try**


	10. Treetops and Dirt

**ANNOUNCING READ THIS- Hey there, I'm back again!** **again, do you guys want me to spend some time with their childhood, or speed up a little to the timeskip? leave a review with the answer please. I'll take into account the replies from last chapter. I'm sorry if pacing is a bit slow right now, but I need it to be until Natsu meets Layla, as that is important for later in the story. I promise it will pick up in pace once he does, so until then please bare with me!**

* * *

The first few months of school passed by without much incidence, other than Natsu and I getting into our fair share of fights. They were always trivial, and never escalated beyond anything more than childish rowdiness. It was always more fun when we were together after all. Ms. Spetto for one, was absolutely ecstatic that the two of us had reconciled with each other, gushing over how close the two of us were. Of course we were close; Natsu didn't know what personal space was, he was always throwing his arm over my shoulders and grabbing my hands, not that I minded because he was never forceful or rough. The sweet old lady was very kind to the both of us and she positively _adored_ Natsu, always pulling his cheeks and giving him hugs, to which he protested of course.

It wasn't all sunshine and daisies though, as Natsu had gotten a reputation for being, well... there's no easy way to put it: fat. Not that there was anything wrong with being a little round! With the amount he ate, it was only to be expected, and I had nothing against it obviosusly, but for some reason it seemed like the other kids did. They were constantly calling him out for his weight, calling him "fatty" and "lardbutt", yeah really mature things like that, sometimes even shoving him. They gave me weird looks too, as if wondering why I associated with Natsu; it just made me want to slap their smug faces some times. They were really cruel to him but for some reason Natsu always shrugged it off, even though I told him that he should do something about it, _anything_. At those times he simply called me weird and went back to whatever he was doing, whether it be building a mud castle or collecting leaves; he was always doing strange things like that during recess. While the others were either racing each other or playing tag, the two of us merely went tree-climbing; not as dangerous as that event with the swing but it still kept our heart rate up.

Usually, we would use those times at the top of the tree to relax and talk, which would invariably always lead to teasing. On one of those particular instances during a cold and dreary November day, I was struck by a sudden thought, "Natsu, what's your mother like, you've never mentioned her?". My question seemed to cause him some mild surprise, and his face adopted a thoughtful look, one that rarely appeared on it. He sat there, his back up against the trunk, the wind rustling his hair and causing his scarf to blow a bit (now that it was cold, it actually made sense for him to wear it), and he simply sighed, releasing some unknown tension.

"You know what Lucy? I'd like to know that myself actually." he said wistfully. I gave him a look.

"What do you mean?"

"What I mean, is that I don't know my mom, all I've ever had is Igneel." That shocked me a little because I couldn't imagine my life without mama. Of course that was probably due to father being the big dummy that he was, but that was beside the point.

"And that's another thing, why do you call him Igneel? He _is_ your dad after all." I said with an air of incredulity. If I ever called my father, "Jude", then he would probably ground me for a year, no make that two. He had always insisted I call him nothing but 'father', saying it was, "important to develop habits at a young age". Translation, it meant he didn't want to get too close to me or me to him. Mama once told me that he wasn't always like that, back before his company experienced any success, my father was apparently humble and nice, things I couldn't imagine him being now. There was just something weird about the way he treated me, as if he didn't want to get too attached to me, which made no sense. Whenever I asked mama this, she merely gave me a sad smile and told me that it was nothing, just a figment of my imagination, but I knew that that couldn't be the case. I had yet to crack the mystery though.

Natsu grinned after I asked him about Igneel, it was like lightbulb went off on his pudgy face, "He's the one that _told_ me to call him Igneel you dummy. He told me that he wasn't my real father, and so I shouldn't call him like he was. I don't care, saying Igneel is cooler anyway." he said cheerily. I never knew where the pink-haired boy in front of me got his enthusiasm for life from, whether the situation be good or bad, he never gave up on his way.

"Wait? What do you mean he's not your _real_ father?" I asked.

"Well, he said that when I was a baby, my parents didn't want me or something like that, and that he found me on the side of the street, in a basket." Natsu said, looking increasingly uncomfortable. I didn't blame him, that was quite a disconcerting story.

"And.. you're okay with that?"

"Well, I know I'm okay with Igneel, so I guess the same goes for that too." he said, trying to smile but failing. I realized that this might have been a touchy subject, so I acted quickly.

"Well, as long as you're happy." I said curtly, "Listen, I was wondering if you wanted to come over to my house and play? We've got _huge_ trees in our backyard." That got his attention.

"Really?! I'd love to come over! When?!" he asked, excited.

"Today after school should be fine right? I'm sure mama will love meeting you." I smiled, glad that he had gotten out of his funk. Natsu was jumping up and down with anticipation, but, as per usual, he messed up. His foot caught the edge of the branch we were sitting on, "WHOOOOAA!", and he started to fall. However, I acted quickly, grabbing onto any part of him that I could, which regrettably ended up being the hem of his pants.

"Whew, I got you Natsu." I breathed out.

"Lucy! Pull me up!" he cried, dangling upside down. I started to pull him up, but excuse me for having a hard time doing the near impossible. I was a stick, how could I do this? I pulled and tugged with all my might, when I heard a ripping sound; his pants became loose, and came off! Now all Natsu was left with were his boxers, which hilariously had chibi dragons on them!

Despite the gravity of the situation, I laughed out loud, "BWAHAHAHA! What kind of underpants are those! Hahaha!"

Natsu blushed fifty shades of red, "They're _dragons_ , thank you very much." he snarled, "Now please! Pull me up!"

"Don't you think I'm trying you idiot!" I screeched, the sinews of my arms crying out in searing hot pain the longer I held him. I gave out a big breath, and started to meditate for five seconds, before concentrating all my energy into one action: pulling him up. Using strength I didn't know I had, I heaved him up in my go, pulling him up quickly. He scrambled back onto the branch, thankful.

When we came back down, I was still giggling lightly, much to Natsu's chagrin, "What!?"

"Oh nothing, it's just I've never seen underpants like those before!" I laughed, causing him to redden again. I watched as his face morphed from embarrassment into one of scheming, a devilish smirk on his face. He came up to me, arms behind his back; I stood my ground.

"Lucy, I didn't thank you for saving me up there." he said with a crocodile smile and a wicked grin.

"Oh, it's fine." I tried to say, backing up to try and avoid whatever he had come up with.

"No really, and to thank you, I got you THIS!" Natsu yelled the last word as he smeared my face with dirt before taking off. I was livid.

"Natsu, you big dummy! I'm gonna kill you!" I shouted at the top of my lungs, chasing after him. He was surprisingly fast for someone his size, but I eventually managed to catch up with him when he was out of breath. Too bad I was wheezing too. Natsu simply collapsed on the ground in a heap, and I collapsed on top of him; it was like falling into a marshmallow.

"Oof, you weigh a lot you weirdo."

"Says you." I countered, still trying to catch me breath, "So, is your dad okay with you coming over?"

"Oh yeah, of course he is, he said if I ever made friends that I should cherish them with all my heart." Natsu said earnestly. I gawked at his words; he had never had a friend before either huh? I didn't understand how he couldn't have; he was a pretty conspicuous kid, both in personality and appearance.

* * *

 **Please R &R, they make my day! Also again if you want me to incorporate more genres, please review, thank you!**

 **replies:**

 **Gh0st's buddy- of course!**

 **I have to respond to long-ass guest review- Thank you for your comments! I will pick up pace, I'm not going to do their whole childhood with great detail. However, it is necessary to establish some history for them. If I just said, bam they become friends, then do a ten year timeskip or something to get to the three year one, it would be, well, bland. I promise that the childhood will make it more** **profound.**

 **Astroman1000- seven is a odd hunk! Don't worry they will both be much older.**

 **lifeisafairytail- thanks for** **reviewing! yeah i won't wait a super long time, but I can't rush it either, you know?**

 **Celestialite- I did!**


	11. Old Comrades

**Hello! So sorry I haven't updated past two days or so, I had** **schoolwork. Again, I might not be able to update tomorrow, but definitely will o Friday, probably in the evening. Also, special thanks to HardKnockLiv, i think i spelled that right, for their superb suggestion for the timeskips. I like that the idea the best, (doing small timeskips until big one.) Its a compromise. I know this chapter is a little short, but I am pressed for time right now, and wanted to update for you guys. R &R!**

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For the rest of that day at school, Natsu would _not_ calm down, no matter what I did. He was constantly racing around the class, doing every activity he could lay his hands on; the other kids were more than annoyed. Even when Ms. Spetto announced to the class that it was quiet time, he was still jumping up and down in his seat, in a silent but enthusiastic cheer nonetheless. Poor Ms. Spetto nearly had a heart attack when she was jolted by a bouncing Natsu from her thoughts; he didn't pay any mind though, and just went back to being even _more_ hyper-active that usual. Some of the kids were whispering darkly in the corner, but I tried to ignore them; if Natsu didn't let it bother him, why should I?

As the bell rang, signaling the end of school, Natsu jumped straight out if his seat, grabbed my hand, and, while shouting a 'goodbye' to Ms. Spetto, raced us out the door, "Whoa, Natsu! Slow down, my legs are hurting!" I complained to no avail.

"Nah, we gotta get to the front quick!" he shouted in reply, ironically quickening his pace. By the time we got to the lobby, my legs were on fire. I sat down for a bit to cool them off. Natsu meanwhile was frantically searching for his father, Igneel, in the sea of parents outside the door. Finally spotting him, he dragged his father over to where I was still resting.

"Yo, Igneel, is it ok if I go over to Lucy's house today to play?" Natsu asked, his eyes impossibly big. Igneel took a moment to focus in on me, and then seemed to recognize me as that same girl from the first day of school.

"Well well well boy, seems you _actually_ listened to me for once and apologized to this girl." he smiled warmly, "Hello, I don't know if you remember, as that was a pretty hectic moment, but I am Igneel, Natsu's dad." Igneel said, extending his hand towards me.

"H-hello." I said slowly, shaking his hand.

"Hmmm, I guess when you're not mad at someone for puking on you, you're actually quite shy Lucy." Igneel laughed, making me blush and hide under the hood of my coat.

"Igneel, stop being such a meanie!" Natsu fumed, "Me and Lucy are friends now, and you still haven't answered my question!" Natsu started to bang his fists on a still laughing Igneel's back, but it was the equivalent of an ant hitting a rock.

"Oh, that? Yeah sure, you can go, though I would like to meet one of your parents if you don't mind dear?" Igneel asked.

"Um, yes, I think mama should be coming soon." I said, peering into the crowd.

"What's your mother's name?" Igneel asked, trying to make some small talk while we waited.

"Layla!" I said brightly; something seemed to snap in Igneel's eyes, as if he had just figured out a riddle.

"You must look a lot like your mother, hmm?" he asked cautiously.

"Yeah! Everybody says so." I replied; what could he have been thinking?

"Is your last name, by any chance, Heartfilia?"

My eyes widened slightly, but I didn't mind it _too_ much. It's just, mama and father had always told me to be careful when talking about my name, one of the few times father had said _anything_ to me at all. They said that if the wrong people knew just who we were, it would spell trouble; really that had been more along the lines of what mama had said. She had had a grave look in her eyes, like she was re-experiencing something foul.

"Hatfylia!? What kind of name is that?" Natsu asked rudely.

"HEARTFILIA! And it's mine, dummy." I snapped, hitting his head. While Natsu went down rub his head, Igneel was still deep in thought, having a far-away look in his eyes. Then, he simply sighed and smiled, and shook his head lightly.

Just then, I heard a voice, "Lucy! Honey? Are you there?" it was mama.

"Over here mama!" I yelled. Mama saw me and smiled, and started to make her way over to us. Unbeknownst to me, Igneel saw her and his whole face went into shock, paling and and his breathing became labored. When mama came, she ventured a look at who was standing with me, and her face registered the same shock that had been on Igneel's.

"I-Igneel...?" she stuttered in almost a whisper, which was strange because mama was never one to be lost for words.

He gave a tired smile, "We meet again, Heartfilia."

* * *

 **Uh, oh what's this? Could be nothing, could be something... Im not telling! Anyway, thanks to eryone who viewed and followed and what not. And also to everyone who** **reviewed! It think that was the most reviews Ive ever gotten for a chapter so far for any of my stories, so please keep them coming, I enjoy them!**

 **SORRY FOR SHORT CHAPTER, I KNOW A LOT OF YOU WANTED LONGER ONES, BUT I AM VERY BUSY TODAY, NEXT ONE WILL BE MUCH LONGER!**

 **replies: (lots of reviews last chapter!)**

 **Celestialite- yeah, you really gotta dig into your brain for the image. I think I get your reference btw.**

 **chibi dragon- yeah sorry about short chapters, I don't have a lot of time to do long chapters daily, but expect the next chapter to be much longer, since I wont have homework then.**

 **mkben- well, that they are**

 **Gh0st's buddy- thanks for advice. Yeah I'm really not sure about it right now, flashbacks for me more add to a story that doesn't have a timeskip in the beginning itself, you know what I'm saying?**

 **Bird person- Thank You! yeah, haha, they are a little too smart aren't they? Its hard to write their perspective, cuz i certainly don't remember my thoughts when I was 4! This chapter isn't too much with the smartness of the two, or at least I hope so***

 **fangirlsweg- thank you for support! they won't be 4 he whole story of course, and i decided to do smaller timeskips, so you'll see them maybe, when they're like, 7, 10, 13, somehthing like that?**

 **Sabertooth7- yeah, sorry about the pacing, I wanted to build a little on them first, please bare with me! I promise it'll add to the story.**

 **ab918- yeah ikr? I want to build a bond first, a platonic one tho.**

 **Sakura-fiction- patience dear reader, it'll happen eventually.**

 **HardKnockLiv- again, thank you very much for the support and idea! I really liked your suggestion, it made logical sense**

 **InTheLifeOfJake- thanks, I hope you continue liking the story!**

 **\- thanks very much, its appreciated, keep reviewing!**

 **Kat the Neeko- thanks for advice! I do like writing the two as young characters, very entertaining!**

 **AllieHatesYodi- hope i got name right, and here it is!**

 **idevourbooks- interesting usrnm, and thank you for reading and reviewing!**


	12. House Surprises

**Well, here it is as I promised, though it is a little late, very sorry it couldn't be longer, i think I'm suffering from sleep depression. AP Chem and calc BC tests kept me up all night thursday and lang before that! I have slept at 2:00 AM for the past _three_ days, not counting Friday, and I have freaking soccer practice 3 times a week! It's killing me! I hate taking 6 AP's, but I can't complain, I'm used to this fucking tryhard school life. Playing a sport along with it is pretty stressing, I'm glad I got my SAT's done in the summer! I see all my friends scrambling to study and i laugh at them! I wonder if you guys can guess what i got, you can leave a review !? Since I forgot to manga review for 453, I'll do it at the end of this ****chapter!** **Please R &R! ALSO, IM INTERESTED IN HOW MANY OF YOU ARE GIRLS, AND HOW MANY OF YOU ARE BOYS! I NEED TO ANALYZE THE DEMOGRAPHIC THAT THIS STORY ATTRACTS! I ask all followers please take a second to review, I don't care if it's guest or not. I'm just really curious too!**

* * *

Natsu and stared at our respective parents with our mouths wide open. What were the odds that the two knew each other?! I watched as Igneel's eyes seem to reflect ages of memories within them, as if he was recalling days spent in the past, a long, long time ago. Mama was still getting over her initial shock, looking as if she had seen a ghost that she had encountered in the past.

It was strange, the two looked as if they knew each other well; that was evident enough by the nostalgic look in their eyes, my little four year old brain thought of it as a strange look of happiness. Mama had never mentioned anyone remotely similar to Igneel, and it looked like the two went way back. They still hadn't said anything other than each other's names, but then something strange happened. With a quick flick of their eyes, their demeanor changed with a practice of hardened training, and the nervous air despaired, replaced by a faux one. Mama turned to me and Natsu, her eyes quickly adoring his image.

"Is he yours Igneel?" she asked, bending down onto her heels to come face to face with Natsu. He looked a little shy, his big cheeks heating up a bit, something that he rarely was; mama's personality often did that to people.

"Yeah, this is Natsu." Igneel said proudly, patting his son's head. Mama smiled at my friend, extending her hand out to him, Natsu still looked a bit hesitant, but he slowly reached out his hand, letting mama caress it in a loving gesture.

"Oooooh, you are sooo cute!" she gushed, pushing his cheeks together, so that he looked like a fish. I laughed. He glared at me, silently telling me to stop, but I continued on anyway. "Are you friends with my daughter, Natsu?" mama asked.

"Um, yeah, but only after I _accidentally_ up on her, heheh." he choked out. Mama's face had a knowing look on it as she passed her eyes over me. I shrunk a little under her gaze, remembering our little talk about the whole vomit situation. I was, of course, happy with the way things had turned out. The very big, pudgy, and fat kid from that day had made for a _very_ good friend. I say 'fat' in jest, because Natsu really was, that was inarguable, but there was nothing wrong with having a little more skin on your body than other people.

"Well, Natsu, I hope you and my Lucy become great friends!" Mama smiled, causing Natsu to give her one in return.

"Oh, yeah, Mama, we were wondering if Natsu could come over to play toda-"

"I'll drive the two of you." Igneel cut in, "That shouldn't be a problem, right, Heartfilia? I've been meaning to ask you some questions anyway..." Mama looked a bit apprehensive only for a split second; I caught it in her eyes, but she was a master of facial expressions, and simply nodded her head with a small smile. Igneel led the two of us to his car, a black Sudan. Natsu and I excitedly clambered in, shoving each other playfully. The inside was littered with remnants of food; there was a half-eaten lollipop on the floor, and some gum was on the ceiling, looking as if Natsu had spit it up there. I shuddered. Looking outside, I was met by an image without mama in it; she must have already started to walk home. I was struck by a sudden thought with the force of lightning.

"Wait, Mr. Igneel-"

"Call me Igneel, dear."

"-Igneel, what about Natsu's motion sickness?" I was worried because if there was one thing that I didn't want again, it was to be thrown up on, though I wouldn't kick him this time; maybe.

"Oh, don't worry, we have patches for the idiot."

"HEY! DON'T CALL ME A-" Natsu started, but quickly succumbed into a sorry state as soon as Igneel hit the ignition. I chortled a bit at that.

"Here, take it before you threw up on the poor girl _again_." Igneel laughed, handing the patch to Natsu who took it with a vigor befitting a hungry bear. It managed to calm him down a bit, but his face still sported a green look the whole way; it really was a debilitating case, but it sure was funny when you weren't getting thrown up on!

The drive was a short one, my house was only a mile away. As we finally neared the cover, I noticed the overcast sky, with dotted clouds; the sky was getting ready to cry. I heard a gasp from beside me, and I turned to see Natsu's open mouth. He seemed at a loss for words, as his eyes grew ever larger, his face getting a wondrous sheen to it, "This is your _house_?"

Here we go.

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 **-So, so sorry I couldn't do do longer chapter, I have soccer this weekend and it takes a lot out of me to play in the sweltering sun; I hate playing in the heat, I prefer the freezing cold. And guess what? I just learned that a bunch of the guys on my team have gotten blowjobs and already had sex and shit, DA HELL? We're only 16! i mean i haven't even held someone's _hand_ before. But then again I'm not really too interested in that stuff, too busy for that. And I saw Scorch trials on friday with 2 friends, we all liked it, but not because Dylan O' Brian was in it like all the girls in the theater XD, JK! And please review, I like them!**

 **Well, there you go, there will be another small time-skip soon, so don't worry okay? In case you were wondering about pacing, this story is _meant_ to be taken slowly, so don't fret!**

 **Manga 453 review:**

 **Well, well, well. A lot happened this week; a whole chapter with subtle romance imagery, never thought i'd see it in FT. Nalu is pretty much confirmed, he obviously wants to confess to Lucy once battle is over when he said he had "things to do". What else could he possibly want to do, eat a shit ton of food, i don't think so. The most important people in his life were Happy, Lucy, and Igneel, and now that the latter's dead, unless he wants to do some bestiality shit with Happy (kidding XD), it's something to do with Lucy all the way. Gajeel and Lecy seem to be bangin'; smutty fanfics incoming. Gray pretty much broke graylu shippers' hearts (i hate that ship). Oh and maybe people who say nalu is invisible will back the fuck off now! It looks like Ajeel attacked by himself, disregarding zeref's orders. This is probably last arc, unless Anksheram (god who cursed Zeref and Mavis) turns out to be the final** **villain (so the last villains would be the gods themselves). That would be about the only way that FT avoids pulling a Bleach if it continues on.**

 **replies (there were a lot, thank you!):**

 **cloudcather- aww, thank you, you're sweet! Im looking forward to continuing this too!**

 **celestialite- I have injected some suspense into this story, but don't worry won't show up until much later!**

 **VvnDaLu- yes, thank you! I am continuing as you can see!**

 **Astroman1000- Thank you for words! I appreciate it.**

 **Kat the Neeko- yeah some suspense, and the Mest reference was on point!**

 **FallingStars16- thank you, I didn't want to stick to usual tropes, you know?**

 **FuckingAwesome123- Sadly, I think this is last arc, but there is still hope yet!**

 **Gh0st's Buddy- Yes, it will be.**

 **Bird person- hope you got my PM!**


	13. Almost

**Damn, I'm so tired, I keep falling asleep in class. On the bright side, this story went _over 100_ followers! Thank you guys! Looks like most of you are girls, based on reviews, thanks for that; I was sort of expecting it but its still interesting to know who is more attracted to this story! future ****reference when it parenthesis, its older Lucy filling in with some info. If a new manga chapter has not released by the time I update, I'll just tell you something that happened to me to keep you entertained, toodles. Please R &R**

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The black car pulled up onto a windswept road, worn out after years of use and even more use. Of course, that was only the _courtyard_ of our house. Natsu was so shocked he had momentarily forgotten to be sick (he's so weird) and was gaping all around him, as if each way his head turned yielded a different sight. Even Igneel let out a low whistle, glancing around here and there. I honestly hadn't expected any less; father had really gone down the extravagant route when he built this estate. Green hills gently rolled all over, eventually leading to the huge mansion in the middle. The house itself was stock with servants and maids; sometimes it was suffocating, I could never just have a moment by myself.

Igneel pulled his car into the wide driveway, hitting the brakes gently until we rolled to a stop. He got out and stretched, Natsu meanwhile tumbled out of the car and yelled, "OW!", before pulling himself back up. "So this is your house Lucy?" he asked.

I shifted my gaze down a bit, "Um, yeah, it's not that great though." I said, trying to remain modest.

"Oh, come on! It's huge, and it looks amazing! I bet there are lots of fun things to do around here!" he said excitedly, waving his arms for emphasis. As he went to go poke a bush, I was left a bit shocked. Mama had always told me that if people knew where we came from, they might not treat us the same as they might have had. I guess that pink idiot really was an exception.

"Lucy!" I turned at the call of my name; it was mama, who had finally strolled up to the front lawn. She came up to me and slid my backpack off of my shoulders; I had actually forgotten it was still there! She motioned for me to follow her to the front steps, and following our lead, so did Igneel and Natsu; we came into the grand hall which was at the front of the house. "Well, I think you and Natsu will have a lovely time today," she said to us with a smile, "Lucy, take Natsu and show him around, Igneel and I have some _things_ to discuss."

The way she said that made me a bit suspicious, but I ignored it. Mama beckoned Igneel to follow her, and he did. To my great surprise, they headed for this room on the direct right, following the entrance. It shocked me because I myself had never been able to go in there. It was the one room in the house I was forbidden to go into. Once, the year before, I had found myself within the rare circumstance of being alone in the huge house. Usually, mama and I were always together at home, because she never really went out without me. When she wasn't by my side, one of the maids usually was. I always appreciated the effort, but sometimes it felt really suffocating.

That day, I had been carelessly wandering around, when I happened across the room by chance. I had realized that I had never been in it before, and so proceeded to do so. To my surprise, as soon as I had neared within 5 feet of the room, mama happened to walk out of it, a frown on her face. She had asked what I was doing and I told her. She had knelt down and carefully instructed me, "Lucy, know that I love you very much, but this is the one room in the house that you absolutely _must_ not go into; it is forbidden." I had gulped and nodded, actually a little intimidated at that time.

It was no wonder why, then, that my face now wore something akin to being slapped as I watched Igneel close the door after following mama through it. Natsu had not noticed anything, as he was poking around a table that had a plant on it, "Hey Lucy, if I push this, will the plant-pot break?" he asked with gleaming eyes.

"Idiot! Of course it will!" I yelled, "Now get over here!" I beckoned him with my hand, towards a room that was directly across from the one mama and Igneel had gone into. Once he was in, I shut the door lightly behind us and bade him sit on the couch. I sat across from him, and he looked at me expectantly.

"So, what are we gonna do first?"

"Well, mama said I should give you a tour, but first things first! We have a mystery to solve!" I said with a flourish of my hand, like I was some detective. Natsu's eyes lit up just as I knew they would.

"Really! Cool what is it?!" he said, jumping up and down in his seat.

"Well, you saw that room our parents walked into right? Well, I'm not allowed into that one for some reason, but mama went in there with your dad like it was nothing. So we need to figure out why that is!" I finished feeling proud of myself; the look on Natsu's face said otherwise.

" _That's_ the big mystery? It's obvious Lucy."

"And what would that be?" I gritted my teeth.

"It's cuz you're too weird to see that room, your mo- WHOAH, HEY! Put that pillow down!" he yelled, scooting back, for at that moment I had grabbed the closest thing to me and waved it menacingly at him.

"Call me weird one more time Natsu!" I threatened.

He gave me a crooked grin, "Alright... _weirdo._ " I completely lost it. In a flurry, I dove towards Natsu, angling my pillow to his face, but he ducked and slithered like a snake down the couch, "Ha! You'll have to do better than that!" he taunted.

I growled a bit (ikr) and ran to where he was now slapping his big butt in my direction, taunting me shamelessly. Before he knew it, I had whacked his behind and toppled him over, straddling him while keeping the pillow to his face; his body was flattened a bit because of me. What I did next was cruel but he deserved it; I dug my fingers into the huge amounts of flesh on the side of his stomach and started to tickle him, hard.

"LUCY! Stooooppp! Whoohho, hhooa , HAAAAA!" Natsu screamed as I continued to tickle him, going faster and faster. After he was almost out of breath, I relented and stood up, finished.

"Ughg... You're soooo cruel." Natsu said, feigning pain. I gave him a smug grin.

"Oh stop being such a baby, you're even more ticklish than I am, and that's saying something. Now, let's start out investigation Natsu." I said, as I went to the back of the room to the cabinet and found what I was looking for, a grey magnifying glass. I put it over one eye while closing the other, just like I had seen on tv.

"Woah Lucy! Your eye is soooo big!" Natsu exclaimed, coming up to me to peer at my enlarged eye; he crouched down and put his hands on his knees to get a better look, "Humph! You're not the only one with a special tool, in fact I don't even need one!" he boasted. Natsu proceeded to wrap his scarf around his head and his mouth, so I could just make out his slanted eyes; he looked like one of those desert nomads.

"Nin, nin." he whispered, holding his two hands together as if he was casting some spell. I fought the urge not to laugh.

"Umm... he... what are you doing?"

"It's a top secret ninja technique that Igneel taught me!" Natsu whispered proudly, "You've got your weird glass thing and I've got this."

Not wanting to waste time to argue with him I simply shook my head and motioned towards the door of the room while creeping to it quietly. I quickly latched onto the metal handle and pulled down. When I slid the door open, I made sure to do it swiftly, so as not to make a creaking sound. We were now in the front hall again, and the room that Igneel and mama had disappeared into was right across from us; 20 glorious feet away! With Natsu right behind me, still striking stupid poses that made his tummy jiggle, I stalked up to the left side of the door, and pressed my ear to it, nothing.

"Maybe try putting your ear at the door crack." Natsu suggested in a whisper. I did and he followed suit. The first thing we heard was laughing, and then I could clearly hear my mom's voice.

"Hahaha, you never learn do you Igneel?"

"Obviously I do, that time wasn't my fault." Igneel grumbled about whatever they were talking about. Mama seemed to sigh.

"How long has it been since I left again?" she asked wistfully.

"Hmm, about five years I reckon, though nobody blames you."

"Well, you know now why I _had_ to. Who else was going to take care of Lucy? Especially with Jude's... situation." I thought I heard mama's voice crack a little but I didn't understand why.

"Well, yes, and your daughter has turned out very well so far, I applaud you for it. Then again, you always did want kids." Igneel said thoughtfully.

"Don't be so modest, Natsu seems like he'll grow up to be a fine boy."

"Maybe..." Igneel agreed with silence, "Now, enough small talk Heartfilia, we both know why I'm here." Igneel's tone suddenly became business-like.

Mama sighed, "You know my answer will have to be no."

"This is not just about your daughter Heartfilia," Igneel insisted, "it's about the safety of everyone around her, around _us_ , too."

"Igneel... please understand. I know the risks of me going back, and I can't leave Lucy in that situation, she still has so much to learn as well from me."

By now Natsu and I had almost simultaneously raised our heads to stare at each other, dumbfounded. We did not understand a single word that had been said; it was gibberish to our young minds; in fact Natsu looked a little constipated. We also did not have any idea what was going on between our parents. It looked like our little game had turned real, but before we could bend back down to put our ears to listen, we heard a "Humph" behind us. I gulped.

I turned around, it was Aquarius, one of the servants and one of mama's closest friends, "Well, well, well, what do we have here," she cackled, a wicked gleam in her eye, "two little babies caught eavesdropping." For some reason she had always been hard on me, though I knew deep down inside she must have felt affection _sometimes_ for me. This was not one of those time.

She held her slender hand up, "I'm going to count to three, if you are two aren't out of my sight by then, you don't want to know what'll happen." she enunciated every word, while leaning in with a scary face; she nearly made poor Natsu poop his pants.

"One," Natsu and I had already tore down the hall, making for wherever wasn't _near_ Aquarius. We didn't stop until I saw a bench resting on the side of one of the lesser halls, and sat down on it, exhausted. Natsu followed my lead, wiping his pudgy brow with his hands, "What was that?" he asked, but I had no answer to it.

"Not really sure, but Aquarius ruined it anyway." I said in defeat. Natsu scrunched up his face.

"Yeah, she was so _mean_."

"Tell me about it."

"Almost as mean as you." he said, turning his head to grin at me. Oh, how he got my blood boiling.

"Natsu." I said with barely concealed anger, shaking.

"Yeah?"

"YOU'RE DEAD!" I screamed, and for the umpteenth time that day, we had a fight.

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 **Whoo, there, finally I gave a long chapter, hope you guys enjoyed it.**

 **manga review placeholder: So yeah, what's there to say really? I went to my soccer game on the weekend, roll up in my mom's car trying to act cool (because I was pretending it was mine XD)and got ready to warmup, only to realize I had put my stuff and ball on a hugeass red ant hill. Next thing I know my whole bag, right leg, and right arm are swarming in them! I had to spend the next ten minutes wiping them off, but not before receiving dozens of bites! I then had to play the game against a bunch of assholes who made me pull my hammy and my calf! I still have the bites all over my body!**

 **It gets worse from there! That night I was at a party, and I really need something to drink. I found a "strawberry soda" in a fridge, or so I** **thought, anyway, it turns out it was alcoholic but of course I only figured it out _after_ I drank it! Woke up next morning with a raging headache, cuz the only alcohol I had drunk before was one of those little chocolates with wine in them! ****FML!**

 **replies(keep them coming, I love looking at them!):**

 **Anon for now (sorry I forgot to saner last chapter)- Thank you, and this story will be maybe around 40-50 thousand, but that could change depending on plot.**

 **Gh0st's Buddy- I fucking hate Graylu, the people who ship it only do it because they "look good" together.**

 **SweetieFairy- Thanks? Im sorry it made you cry, but why did you cry anyway?**

 **Astroman1000- yeah, they will begin from now!**

 **Celestialite- I have**

 **Kat the Neeko- hmm clever answer on your part. You fell off your chair?! hahaha**

 **CelestialTitania- nah, Raven Tail was pretty much done and dusted in the GMG by Laxus.**

 **HardKnockLiv- Yeah, thanks. Unfortunately I didn't get enough sleep, but hey, shit happens.**

 **xxstarsnowxx- thank you! I appreciate it**

 **Hul- too cute? thanks!**


	14. Eye of the Storm

**Whoo, we are almost at 100 reviews! Please R &R, I love reading every single one of them, even flames (but sadly nobody has sent one yet, cuz if they did I would destroy their ass soooooo bad in the replies.) **

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Though we did descend into a pretty petty fight right afterwards, the event that Natsu and I had witnessed with our ears pressed to the door crack of the "forbidden room", as we now jokingly referred to it as, never left our minds for the rest of our lives. The rest of that day was spent by touring Natsu around my home, a good thing because I would find him visiting quite frequently after that. Though we had strolled lightly, there was a hard ambience around us, invisible however, yet not quite intangible. The conversation we had heard never left my mind, and I'm sure Natsu felt the same way. It was like a creeper in the back of my mind, always lurking, yet contained too much cunning to strike, patiently biding its time for when we would be most vulnerable, but we knew nothing of it then, and that was still a long way off.

Eventually, the first year of Natsu and I being in the same class passed without any further estranged meetings or conversations between mama and Igneel, and, if they had happened, the two of us had not noticed, and we were both very alert for any activity regarding mama's mysterious past.

The school year was enjoyable enough, however it was marred by the more than occasional bullying directed towards Natsu. Most of our classmates incessantly talked behind his back, and the more bolder ones took to frequently stealing his lunch. The gossiping he could handle, mostly because he never actually heard it, his senses weren't that developed yet. The lunch-stealing however, was cruel.

There was this one time when his whole pack had been taken and thrown in the dumpster outside near the playground. Instead of throwing a tantrum like everyone thought he would, me including actually, he had simply stared down for a while, a despondent aura about him, until he had looked back up and towards me, a silent pleading in his eyes. I understood what he had meant right away, and offered him some of my lunch. It had been the only time that the two of us had gone through lunch in silence. He had just sat there, unresponsive and not listening to my feeble attempts at small talk, while slowly filling out his big cheeks with food. I had hated seeing him suffer like that, but what could I do? I didn't know who had done it, and even if I did, I wasn't really someone who the other kids might listen to.

Me being Natsu's only friend and vice-versa didn't really put me in the best position. Actually, some of the girls had once come up to me during recess one day and asked me to play jumprope with them. I had been a bit taken aback, because I never really reached out to anyone else; Natsu by himself was more than a handful. I had happily turned around to call Natsu when one of them had said rather rudely, "Oh, we don't want _him_ to come." I had given her a glare and told her that if I went, Natsu went, to which she replied that it was my loss before turning away. Natsu had said to me then that I didn't have to do that but I shot him down right away. That was no way to treat my best friend.

Really, the behavior of the other kids to Natsu had shocked me that year. The way the treated him should have hurt him more, but it didn't for some reason. That bright personality of his was like a bastion of light, never fading, always constant.

When the year ended, I was actually a bit relieved, more for Natsu's sake than my own. What the two of us unforunately did not know was that that was only the beginning of it.

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 **Whoo, another chapter done. Have you guys read, trial by fire? It's really good!**

 **Manga review placeholder-**

 **Hmmm, well Thursday I had soccer practice for two hours all through freezing rain, and I was so wet by the end of it, and in my haste to leave, I forgot my shoes! So there they sat, all through the night! The next day, after school, I go back to get them, some idiot threw them in the trash!**

 **replies: (keep reviewing please!)**

 **Kat the Neeko- yeah, I will avoid those hellholes from now on, I still have fucking bites all over my body.**

 **Anon for now- thank you, I will reveal no secrets yet!**

 **xxstarsnowxx- oh, patience, it'll be a while yet**

 **KittyCrow12- good to know**

 **Astroman1000- can't reveal yet!**

 **Danny Tanner- thanks for idea, Sting _is_ overused(Stilu is almost as bad as graylu)**

 **Dolphinlover303- thanks, keep reading!**


	15. Second Grade A Coming

**Right, very sorry about not updating in like 2 weeks. I've had major sleep deprival for the past week because of school. I'm planning to try and write a fantasy epic for this fandom maybe, after this story is complete. But after all, its very hard to build a world as if it were a set of legos. Works like LOTR have always been very influencing on me. Very sorry this chapter is so short, I didn't have time for anything else!**

 **Also if any of you have a twitter, follow me atsignWrathofCthulhu.**

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"Oooofff" my body thudded down onto the hard wood floor of my room. My head was ringing with a stinging pain, like bees buzzing in my head. Half of my torso was awkwardly lain across the floor, the blanket still clinging to me. The cause of my discomfort was sitting on my bed, grinning.

He quickly yanked the blanket making me flip over onto the ground and groan in pain, "You absolute idiot. What have I told you about waking me up in the mornings before my mom?!"

Natsu simply scoffed at my admonishment and proceeded to wiggle his big butt down the bed, puffing up his cheeks in what was supposed to be an impression of me, "Hello, I'm Lucy, and I'm the crankiest girl on earth!"

"Oh, you're asking for it now!" I exclaimed and leapt up onto my bed, making him shriek like a little girl. "hahaha," I snickered, while tickling him, "that'll teach you to bother me again!"

"Oh shut up, you know you love it." he heaved out, still recovering. I didn't answer and just spared him a wry smile.

"Wait downstairs and maybe mama will give you some breakfast, I need to get ready for our first day of second grade!"

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 **I'm so very sorry for not updating for a bit, school and extracurriculars have been very hard on me recently. I will try to start getting the chapters out more frequently! Again, very sorry for how short it is, but I wanted to get this out to you guys!**

 **Also if any of you have a twitter, follow me atsignWrathofCthulhu.**

 **Chapter 454 review:**

 **I liked that the side characters got a little bit of love, but why is Asuka so close to the battle? Also when I first read this I really hoped Erza wouldn't do another asspull and win again, good thing she** **didn't. And the dragon slater motion sickness was pretty lame tbh.**

 **Chapter 455 review:**

 **Well, Warren's a little pussyassbitch, and we see more team Osprey action. And also, we saw that Cana has a lesbian rival for Lucy! I'm loving the higher number of characters this arc tho, and the pacing is very slow and instantaneous, very much like One Piece and Bleach. I guess this is good because that means the arc will be the longest yet! Also the dragon slayer fight looks interesting.**

 **Chapter 456 review: Well, my OTP is back, MAXxBROOM FTW! Also we see that Lucy is about to have some hot lesbian sex/fight, whichever I don't really care either way! Also it looks like Natsu actually has matured, finally. The slayers fight was good since it didn't end in one shots all around. Mira's power is pretty cool actually too. I also liked how Erza is actually struggling for once, I thought Ajeel was pretty weak at first tbh.**

 **replies:**

 **Rose Tiger- Yeah, I wouldn't know tho, Ive never actually witness or experienced it in my life. I think this small little bitch boy tried to bully me once in 6th grade, but I beat the shit out of him, jk! But I did shoot him down faster than an enemy plane.**

 **Wallace11- thanks, It'll go quite a bit hopefully!**

 **KittyCrow12- um, well I'll sprinkle them in here and there. What Ive seen in a lot of fics is that they all meet at once, and thats just not realistic.**

 **ftx777x- yeah, shame it's over.**

 **Dolphilover303- Yeah, fucking Graylu is incest, the fangirls for it piss me off!**

 **Sareena- oh he will after the timeskip, don't worry.**

 **Kat the Neeko- hahaha, thats pretty funny actually.**

 **HardKnockLiv- Oh, don't worry it'll be a good ride.**


	16. New Acquaintances

**Here's the next chapter, I really didn't expect that many reviews last chapter, so thank you! Interestingly another one of my stories (ancient outlook) got like nominated or something for some fanfic competition on inkitt. I didn't enter it, but its weird because I know a huge number of people didn't read it, so I wonder why it was invited then?**

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Natsu trailed impatiently in front of me, gesturing for me to walk at a faster pace. Mama had long since abandoned walking me to school herself, finding a wild Natsu following us every time she did. She eventually just realized that it was better that Natsu and I walk by ourselves. The neighborhood was safe and she could get to us at a moments notice.

Actually, I had asked her how she'd be able to respond to us quickly if we needed her, and she had given me a wry smirk and said mysteriously, "We all have our ways, dear." Not really sure what to think of that... maybe she's some sort of ninja, mama never fails to surprise me!

Yeah right.

I saw the red stop sign that was always at the crosswalk that lead into our school. Sweet Apple had went through some changes during the summer break. The number of kids who went to the school had increased, something to with a process mama had called 'gerrymandering' or something; it was all Greek to me. Anyhow, it meant that the two of us would have a lot more classmates now, and that meant more potential friends!

Neither of us had really made friends with anyone else since meeting each other. It's not like we _tried_ to avoid people, or at least I know I didn't. People just didn't seem to want to associate with the girl who was best friends with the fat kid, much less the fat kid. Not that I would ever become close to anyone who repelled Nastu anyway. We had had the same bad luck for the past two years, and this year could sure be a good way to snap that streak!

Unfortunately for me, I was lost in my thoughts, which I often was, and allowed Natsu to snatch the book I was cradling under my right arm.

"Hey! Natsu, that's not funny!" I yelled in exasperation. Really, his pranking nature would never go away, would it? We had arrived at the front doors, and the little rascal had taken the opportunity to deftly steal my book; I had been worshipping it for the past week. It was a fantasy novel, and it was positively _gripping_. Mama had told me that it may have been too hard for me to read, but I had had no problems with it so far.

Before I could speed off to catch Natsu and beat him up, a girl to my right asked me, or more like exclaimed, "Hey! You're reading 'The Hobbit' too?"

I swiveled to stare at this newcomer; she was a short girl, shorter than me by quite a bit. Her petite body looked like it had yet to develop into that of a child's yet, but her eyes had a smart expression in them. She had short, wavy blue hair, that was tucked onto her head with a hairband. Her orange frock topped it all off nicely, highlighting her light skin.

She seemed a bit taken aback at my searching gaze, "Oh... I'm sorry for shouting. It's just, I've never seen anybody my age reading that book before." she said, unzipping her backpack to show me her copy.

I shook myself, "Oh! No, I wasn't offended or anything! I was actually just about to go chase my idiot friend over there." I said, pointing behind to where Natsu was sticking his tongue out at me.

"Oh, your friend? The f- I mean the one with pink hair?" she caught herself just in time.

"If you were about to call him fat, go ahead, everyone else does too." I replied dryly. To my surprise, the girl wore a very hurt expression on her face.

"Oh no! I would never insult someone like that! It's just, the first word that came to my mind when I saw him was... _that,_ but I don't want to be rude at all!" she said determinedly, "In fact, let me introduce myself, my name is Levy McGarden, I used to go Orange Elementary, but I was switched to this school during the summer." she talked with a bit of authority, but she managed to come off as sincere at the same time; that was rare. This girl seemed like she was smart, but also sort of naive. Her twiddling thumbs let me know that she was nervous.

I motioned for her sit down at a table with me, as the bell had not yet rung, "Well Levy, my name is Lucy, that idiot back there is Natsu," I hissed, jerking my finger towards him yet again, "and if you need anybody to talk to, or play with, we're all yours." when I said it I wasn't expecting her to jump me with a hug; this girl could move.

"Oh thank you, thank you, thank you," she rambled quickly, "I thought I was gonna have to make friends all over again!" she said with a pout. _Tell me about it_ I thought and gave her a smile. My own friend-making experience, if you can even call it that, was not exactly stellar or perfect, but it would have won the award for 'most disgusting way to meet a friend' hands down. This girl, Levy, seemed nice enough at first glance, which was not really the case with our other classmates. Usually it took one wave of the hand from Natsu and the other kids would go mental, idiots.

Levy looked like she wanted to say more, but just then the bell rang, "Oops, there it goes! Bye Lucy, hope I can see you again soon!" and with that the spritely girl frolicked away, the ends of her frock whistling through the wind.

"Whoa, did ya meet another weirdo or something?" Natsu asked, as he came up behind me.

I irritably yanked the book out of his grasp, "No, and the only weirdo here is you." I retorted, causing him to give me a sarcastic look. "No, that was a new girl, her name is Levy. She noticed me because apparently we have the same book and she was shocked about it. Anyway, it looks like we might have a new friend." I said with a grin.

His eyes lit up at that, I always wondered if there was like a lightbulb in his skull or something, "Really! Sweet Lucy! Now we can have a three-way eating competition instead of just you and me!"

Ah yes, the eating competitions. I had been stupid enough to agreed to one with him maybe a year ago; worst decision I ever made, period. I think I actually passed out from exhaustion if I remember correctly. The loser had to do all of the winner's chores for two weeks, and let me just tell you, cleaning Natsu's room is _not_ a good way to spend your Friday evening.

"Natsu, I thought I told you after last time that there is _no way_ in the world that you could rope me into one of those ever again?"

He gulped a bit at my tone but had enough gall to answer, "Well, I thought since it had been a while?" he saw my expression deepen, "Or maybe I'll just challenge that Levy girl!" he said hastily. Just imagining that caused me to laugh.

"Thank you, now do you know who's class we're in? I didn't get a chance to check the e-mail they sent mama."

"Hmm, well, I think Igneel told me it was someone named Chickentiger or something?" Natsu said uncertainly, "But, that's a really weird name, almost weirder tha-"

"Zip it! If you finish that sentence I'll steal your lunch!" I threatened; he just blew me a raspberry. Hmmm, Chickentiger? What an odd name, it was certainly new to me.

A sinapse clicked in my brain, I actually knew who that was! Last year, I had heard about a teacher with that same, albeit strange, name. She was supposed to be really nice, but knowing me, and unfortunately Natsu, we would probably find some harebrained way to mess it up; at least we tried! After motioning for him to follow me, Natsu and I sped down the familiar halls to where I knew our new classroom would be.

The class itself wasn't very vibrant, in fact it was pretty plain; there was a blue rug in the middle, and it was surrounded by about 20 small desks in a circular shape. A whiteboard off to the right and a window lightly decorated with flower stickers finished my eyes' mundane tour of the room.

A young woman, who I could only assume to be Ms. Chickentiger, was standing near a mahogany desk in a little nook off to the corner. She was much younger than most teachers at the school, and her long, light brown hair was neatly combed down her back, free from any elastic monsters. Kids were still filing into the room in droves, so Natsu and I took our seat near the back left side of the room.

As I sat down, I noticed that the kid next to me was sniffling a bit. Peering closer, I made out a pair of broken glasses sitting on his face, above a mouth that was trying its best not to bawl.

"Hey, are you okay? What happened to your glasses?" I asked politely.

The boy looked at me with some fear in his eyes, "Thi-this new kid that got redistricted from one of those other schools, he-he punched me in the face... be-before school today." the boy managed to whimper out.

My interest was piqued and my next question didn't really have nearly as much empathy as I could have hoped for, "Wait, really?! Who was he?"

"U-um, well, it was a boy, same grade a-as us actually. H-he punched me after I accidentally bumped i-into him in the hallway. I-I think he had blonde hair, b-but I don't know his name." the scared boy replied rather lamely, ducking his face down again.

I didn't reply to him, mostly because he might have been asleep now; slacker. Fighting wasn't really a big part of my life anyway, it never was an issue at this school. Though, I guess in this case it was more of a beatdown than an actual fight. The only time that I really found myself fighting anyone was when Natsu was getting on my nerves; that idiot. Mama had told me some horrifying stories involving fights at schools though. Once she had recounted a story of how one poor boy had had to be rushed to the emergency room, suffering from internal injuries. Thank god it was in some far off school, nowhere near here. The last thing we needed was publicity for all the wrong reasons.

A breeze filtered in through the window, catching my attention towards the teacher; she was now ushering in the last of the kids into the classroom, trying to get everyone settled in. Class started off as usual, the teacher talked, I tried to listen, and then Natsu made sure I didn't; just spiffy. The cause of his agitation was the ticking clock, edging closer and closer to recess time; he was such a spazz sometimes, but I guess it added to his _charm_.

I took a look at him again.

Scratch that, it added to his incredibly _weird_ charm, but that bright smile of his had no competition.

Ms. Chickentiger realized that most of the class, like Natsu, were just waiting for recess, so she intelligently put down the syllabus that she was reading from and called the class to attention; only about half of us were listening anyway. The boy who got punched had happily dozed off about a half-hour ago, maybe dreaming about scenarios where he _didn't_ get punched.

"Alright class, if I could please have your attention!" the class stirred a bit, some waking up, "Now, I know you are all waiting for recess, I myself could use some sun." she admitted to some cheering, "But, all of us teachers were told by the board of education at the pre-semester staff meeting that we had to explain some finer points about certain _changes_ that have taken place this year. Now as you all know, our school's population went straight up over the summer, and many of you are seeing new faces. This happened because many of these kids were redistricted. For example, last year, Peachtree Elementary finally shut its doors. Those kids had nowhere to go, hence they came here. Sweet Apple has never been filled to its capacity before this year, I know a lot of you who have been here since last year or before are usually used to seeing much less people, but do not worry, though the school is a bit more crowded now, I'm sure all of you will get along well together!" she took a breath, "And now, its recess time!" she said to a general whoop of exclamation. As kids began filing out, Natsu and I followed suit, last.

I thought a bit about her words; really, I hoped what she had said about people getting along happened, but from what I had seen so far, it looked like the exact opposite was about to occur.

* * *

 **whoo, promised a longer chapter, here it is. Second grade will probably be over in the next chapter or so, these small timeskips will be relatively short until the main one.**

 **Manga chapter review placeholder: Well, actually just today, I was at school minding my own business, and I go to the bathroom. My school is cheap, so they don't have napkins to dry your hands with once you wash them. So what I do is just use the tissue paper in the stalls no harm done. Well, some little pussy ass bitch freshman or sophomore, don't really give a shit which, starts railing on me cause he thought I had just washed my hands in the toilet, what a complete** **dumbass, he was a total junkie too. I was seriously contemplating beating the shit out of his sorry ass, but i didn't cuz I'm beta, jk!** **I could have if I wanted to, dude was a scrawny little shit, but I just called him an idiot and walked out. I swear, small kids who think they're the shit piss me off so much. I fucking hate them almost as much as graylu.**

 **replies: (thx for reviews, I love reading them!)**

 **Rose Tiger- thx, good to be back, tho it wasn't _that_ long as fanfic disappearances go**

 **HardKnockLiv- thx, I don't think I'm too good at characterizing younger kids, I don't remember much of my thoughts from that age.**

 **Gh0st's Buddy- yeah, I mean Idc too much about it, since haters gon hate anyway, but it will probably inspire some smut to be sure!**

 **thatnalushipper- thank you!**

 **Dolphinlover303- tell me about it.**

 **Dark Mystique- well here's a longer one!**

 **Sareena- thanks, i'll keep that in mind**

 **InTheLifeOfJake- Don't worry, have a little patience, longer chapters will come eventually**

 **Kat the Neeko- hmm, you should really get an actual account or something, and watch out for them VPs**

 **Astroman1000- Thank you!**

 **xxstarsnowxx- here you go!**

 **Nora- I will include the age, I might show Natsu's POV as like a bonus, to sure about it yet tho.**

 **Sareena- umm, ok? glad you and friends like the story!**

 **Imari-Neesan- I updated!**


	17. On the naming of Fatsu

**Whoo, it's been a while hasn't it? I promise I will not normally take a month to update in the** **future, probably. School has been very busy and I really feel that it's weighing me down. I just partied the shit out of whatever! This chapter completes second grade for our two adorable little friends. Also Mickey Chickentiger is an actual character from FT, just a very minor one. Sorry for any typos**

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My face met with a cold zephyr as soon as I happened thorough the huge metal doors at the end of the our class hallway. Natsu had raced off to god knows where, muttering something about saving me a spot on the swings; don't know why bothered, I hate those death-traps. While lacing up the zipper of my coat, I looked around for something to do; recess really was just a throng of random kids going in every which way, pure chaos. Some had already started up little four-square games, while others patiently waited their turns on the slide. Mama had once told me how when she was a kid, they didn't have any of the fancy playground equipment that we had, I had cheekily retorted to that and gotten my cheeks pinched in turn.

A tug was felt on my shirt, causing me to turn at the unfamiliar but nice touch; it was the new girl, Levy, "H-hey Lucy, guess we have the same recess huh?"

"Guess so." I smiled at her, prodding her on.

"Uuuuuh, wanna play jumprope?" she sprayed out, looking mortified the moment she uttered it. Nodding to ease her anxiety, I went and found an old rope near the grass next to the school building; it was littered with old stuff, shoes, balls, you name it.

"Have you ever jumped rope before? it was a fair question, but it made Levy a bit flustered; looks like all the poor girl did was read. She bent down to the ground to pick up the handle of the rope near her, twiddling it in her hands.

"Hmm, I've never _actually_ jumped before, but maybe you could teach me...?" she trailed off, giving me her best anime impression. She was just too adorable! The way her lip was pouting bit and her hair all frizzled just had me gushing.

"Of course I'll teach you, we're friends now aren't we?" I asked, reveling in the fell of saying it out loud, like my body was a balloon releasing all of its pent up air. I took a deep breath and let it out, starting forward to show Levy the basics of jumping rope. Let's just say I got a little carried away and ended up doing spins and tricks.

The look on Levy's face was on of pure admiration, "My gosh! Lucy, you're amazing!" she exclaimed, rushing forward to hug me; reminder to self: this girl _loves_ her hugs.

Blushing a bit, I gently tore her hands off of my, "Really, I'm not _that_ good. The only reason I even know how to do it is because Natsu became obsessed with them around a year ago. He tried and failed and gave up, but I ended up loving it!"

"Hahaha, you and he really are close aren't you?" Levy saids suggestively, in a tone that I had not yet thought she was capable of, given her oh so innocent look.

Ah, the inevitable question. This wasn't actually the first time someone had asked me that, oh no. As much as Natsu and I were social pariahs of some sort at the school, it hadn't stopped some of the more nosy girls asking me questions like, "Do you like _him_ or something, that fatty?!" or, "What is it with you two, are you like child lovers or what?"

Each time they asked that, I had to suppress the urge to smack them in the face; after all if Natsu me dong things like that, he would be uncontrollable. Honestly there wasn't anything like that at all between Natsu and I. We were of course too young, but even so, I don't think I could ever like him in that way. Our relationship was purely platonic, and I think that's all it was ever going to be. Mama had always told me to never judge a book by its cover, and I hadn't done that with Natsu.

But, she had also told me that when I met the one I would end up loving, I would feel at least a little bit attracted to them, not in the physical sense, at least not all of it, but in a spiritual sense. Not that I knew what any of that meant, but I knew I didn't feel it towards Natsu, or anyone for that matter. But enough about the complicated world of love, because I had just glanced over at the swings and Natsu was not there.

"Hey Levy, did you see where Natsu went? I asked, but when she instead zeroed in her eyes onto something happening in the field.

There was a throng of kids crowded in the field, creating an epicenter in the middle where their attention was obviously concentrated at. There was a chill of snickering and whispering floating among them, spreading like a fire spontaneously throughout.

"Levy what's happening over there?" I hesitantly asked.

"I-uh, I... don't know." she began slowly, "I'm not really sure _what_ happened. There was some kid, might have been a blonde maybe, I think he started something with Natsu..."

Fear began creeping into my heart, I knew what some of the kids thought of him; if they had their way to bully him, I couldn't imagine what might happen. Before Levy could say "wait" I rushed off, nearing closer to the circle. As I got closer, I could hear the mutterings of the kids better.

"Hahah, he deserved it that fatty."

"He had it coming!"

"I can't wait to see him get his face bashed in."

When I pushed my way through the cloud of people, I gasped; there was Natsu sitting in the middle, a black eye on the right side of his face, his hair all messed up and his lip busted; he looked close to tears. "N-natsu" I whispered, looking at him through my hands. The boy who had done it to him was standing near him, smirking at him like he was a piece of garbage.

"Had enough you you dunce?" he asked menacingly, raising his fists. With a deranged growl, Natsu leapt up at the more athletic boy, and proceeded to get the breath knocked out of him by a square sock to the gut; my breath caught in my throat as I inwardly cried for him. There was thick sweat rolling down his head and he was breathing heavily, close to unconsciousness.

"You're pathetic you know that? You just couldn't leave it after I told you to scram, could ya? Saying you had a friend who wanted to swing with you. Please, who would be friends with you, fatty?" Some of the boy's cronies laughed at that stupidly, encouraging the other kids to chuckle as well. Anger was boiling inside of me, but fear also took root in my mind. Natsu himself looked utterly defeated; I'd never seen that expression on his face before, the air around him giving off a dismal aura.

Luckily at the moment, a teacher made her way over, alerting the crowd of kids. The boy who had pummeled Natsu had the arrogance to soil Natsu one last time as the kids dispersed, "I'll see you around, Fatsu."

The name stuck.

* * *

Later, it got worse, as Natsu Dragneel magically became Fatsu Fatneel. Everyone except for me and Levy called him that. I soon learned that the kid who had beaten Natsu up was called Sting Eucliffe, one of the new students who had transferred schools. His presence made it worse for Natsu everyday, and there was nothing I could do. We tried to keep to ourselves at school, and Levy became closer to the two of us. Mama absolutely adored her, calling her the cutest thing she had ever laid her eyes on.

Thankfully, Natsu was able to avoid Sting and his gang for the rest of the year, but we were always worried that something would happen to him. Mama was always frowning about it, insisting with Natsu that she should tell his dad, but he was always too stubborn for it, demanding that whatever we did, we shouldn't tell Igneel, because Natsu didn't want to look bad in front of him. It was this very stubbornness that would come back to haunt him much later.

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 **Wow, its been a whle hasnt it? School has been very busy, junior year is finally starting to pick up. Icant do replies at the end of this chapter, but I will start again next chapter. I'll try to update more during break rn. Agin, really sorry for not updating in a month, I usually keep track f time much better, but school and then a college showcase for soccer have realy put a damper in things as I have had to travel some.**

 **Past few chapters review:**

 **Now, I havent done this for about 4-5 of them, but uh, here we go. I'm still not sold on how this war is gonna play out. I really want Mashima to write this arc well, as it might be the last one. Spoilers say next chapter will have natsu revealing what's under his bandages**


	18. Foreign Feelings

**I'm back, hope the wait didn't feel too long. I've had school again of course, and I recently got an app called, yeti: campus stories, anyone heard of it? Anyway, that also distracted me a bit, but I'm back now! Also, anyone have a tumblr? hmu**

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"Mmmmhaaa" I groaned as I awoke to the sound of light chirping outside my window. The covers were sprawled beneath me and my legs were hanging loosely down the side of the bed. I couldn't help but feel like I was forgetting something.

Oh yeah, today was the first field trip of the year. Natsu had been in my ear the past two days about it. Normally, field trips were were pretty pathetic like, "Oh, let's all go to the farm a mile down the road to watch them milk cattle!"

Yuck.

But, since we were now fifth graders, the school would be sending us on a much more interesting excursion: the aquarium. Well, it was to Natsu anyway. I myself was not nearly as interested as he was but I was game for a session with the fishies. If Levy was any sort of barometer, my excitement for the trip should have been higher, because she was nearly hyperventilating about the prospect of the aquarium, promising me she'd bring her books on marine life to the place. Honestly, she was an even bigger nerd than me!

I dragged my feet into the bathroom. There was a mahogany cabinet from where I retrieved my brush and toothpaste from. As I got ready, I began thinking about this boy I had talked with a couple times at school, his name was Sora. He was about my height, lean, black hair. Embarrassingly enough, my first impression of him had been that he was cute. He was quieter than most kids, but talked well enough when he wanted to. I always got a bit flustered around him, as he was in my class. I refuse to believe it's a crush, because, well... it just isn't! Though, I wouldn't _mind_ hanging out with him more.

"Lucy, dear, it's time for school!" Mama's signal interrupted my silly thoughts.

She greeted me with a smile as I stepped down the last stair, "Oh yes I forgot, Natsu can't walk with you to school today, something about assisting Igneel with coffee." she said with a roll of her eyes.

"That's fine mama, how did you know anyway?"

Quick as a flash, her eyes glanced at the forbidden room, then back at me; strange, "Of course,.. I have his phone number sweetie." she reassured me, though that quick dart of her eyes told me otherwise. Mama had been acting weird for the past few years, leaving on urgent meetings with no notice, going out of the room when she got a simple phone call, just different, peculiar stuff like that. And, it's been eating at the back of my mind for the past few years, but Igneel somehow tied into it. I still hadn't forgotten that scene Natsu and I had witnessed back then. What was his role? What was Mama's role? How did he and her know each other? Was it dangerous?

These questions and more whizzed around my head whenever my brain found itself in a state of potential; morphing, mixing, and warping into even more doubts and whims.

My thoughts pestered me all the way to school; so much in fact that I totally forgot about the field trip. It was a pleasant surprise, when I observed three special coach buses parked outside the school, with a pool of fifth graders humming and buzzing with anticipation. I quickly scoped out the pink hair that belonged to my best friend; in a sea of black and brown, pink was definitely an outlier.

Feeling a little playful, I snuck up behind Natsu, who was currently entertaining a book-laden Levy, and tapped the shoulder opposite of here I was standing, resulting in a hilarious scene in which the poor boy was spinning in circles blindly!

"Lucy! That wasn't very nice." he said with a pout, crossing his arms in mock anger and looking away, to which I simply stuck my tongue out. Levy just giggled at our antics, too used to them already. While Natsu and I bickered, the teachers were slowly herding everybody onto the buses, anxious to get the trip underway; we honestly didn't care.

The bus driver flashed me a toothy smile as I walked up the steps; one of them was golden. Natsu grabbed my hand as well as Levy's and pulled us along to get a seat near the middle, which he claimed were "the best kind of seats". Sometimes I wondered about that boy. As I stumbled along the gaggle of bodies and legs filing up the narrow walkway, I could have sworn I saw the eyes of Sora, who coincidentally was on this bus, on me. As soon as I looked his way, his eyes swerved the other direction, hoping to avoid being caught; it was not missed by Levy, who, unlike Natsu, was actually aware of her surroundings most of the time. She didn't say anything to me, just gave me an odd look. I really hadn't told her anything about Sora, because... well, what was there to say really right?

We sat down, Natsu near the window me in the middle and Levy on the edge. The idiot tried to stick his head out the window which caused a teacher to almost immediately shout at him. With Natsu distracted, Levy rested her arm on the seat, "Who was that Lu?"

She had taken to calling me 'Lu' since we became friends, saying it sounded good off of her tongue.

I blanked at her question, "Who was who?"

"Don't try that with me." she said, "We both know I'm talking about that dark haired kid sitting up there, I've seen you eyeing him in school too." crap she was too smart for her own good.

Stupidly, I still tried to persist my charade, "Levy I really don't know who you're talking about."

"Really? Well then, I'm sure if I call him over here we can sort this out right?" she said to my immediate horror. Blushing madly, I covered her open mouth and relented.

"Ok, ok, you got me. His name is Sora, I've talked to him a couple times on school, I uh... I sorta kinda... maybe think that uh... he's uh.. a little bit... cute." the last part came out rather muffled.

Levy smiled, "See that wasn't so hard, now was it? But, it seems to me that you might have a little crush."

"DO NOT!" I said.

"Well, there's a simple test, wanna try it out?" she asked, trickery in her eyes. I gulped, Levy's 'plans' never seemed to accomplish what they actually were meant to do. In an act of pathetic desperation, I tried to twist the subject onto her instead.

"Well, what about you huh? Always hanging out with Jet and Droy. I bet you have a crush on one of them!" Jet and Droy were two boys whom Levy had met last year. They were obsessed about her, and not always in a healthy way.

Levy laughed at my accusation, " _Jet and Droy_ , come on Lu, you can do better than that."

"Bu-but, you're always with them and..."

" _So_ , it doesn't mean I like either of them, they're just good friends is all, too bad they couldn't come on this bus actually." she said, shifting her legs into a more comfortable position and putting her books down.

I had no comeback to that, and I just sat there for a few minutes, thinking about what Levy was saying. Did I like Sora? I didn't think so before, but looking back, maybe I did. I did like looking at his face, embarrassing as it was to admit. There was just something about him; maybe it was his personality? I'm not sure. I never really had these kinds of thoughts before after all.

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When the bus finally came to a stop, I got up to stretch my tired legs. As we filed out, I saw Sora come out a few moments after us, and he started coming my way. Then, something I didn't expect to happen occurred. He came right up to me, "Lucy, want to be my trip partner today?

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 **Hahah, Lucy has a crush! Just thought i'd experiment a little, but trust me, next chapter will have a nice twist to it! The OC will not really have much of a role past the next chapter anyway, so don't worry for anyone who doesn't like OC's. Next chapter will have a familiar face.**

 **FT chapter 465 review:**

 **I loved it all the** **reveals and such. I'm really hoping that the war doesn't end too quickly though, as they would feel like a general waste. Naruto's was arc lasted around 200 chapters after all!**

 **Replies:**

 **Rose Tiger: yeah they really are**

 **AngelEmCuti- thank you very much!**

 **AnimeMangaOtaku535- I did!**

 **Kat the Neeko- aawww, missed you too! You still haven't gotten an account yet, shame on you! XD Don't worry about me, Im not gonna die anytime soon! Maybe you have a tumblr?**

 **\- yeah schools been killing me, hope you like the new chapter!**

 **nationalcarmen- yeah thats why I wanted to include their childhood in here. Most of these stories, they progress from having 1st met to lovers rather quickly so...**

 **Gh0st's buddy- guess you are half-disappointed**

 **Sareena- oh, it'll come**

 **Anonymous Person- Yeah, I just had an epiphany for the idea to this story actually. I think it was after wathicng an episode where Natsu looks like a balloon.**

 **xxstarsnowxx- Yeah, I had to inlcuede somebody!**

 **DolphinLover303- we all know now**

 **laxusdreyar2324- I dont partciulaty hate or like Sting, Im just indifferent towards him**

 **AngelEmCuti- thx!**

 **FuckingAwesome123- this girl/boy will continue writing! Thx**

 **FranFranWriter- wow two reviews! Ezra and Gray are still far off.**


	19. Of Seas and Whales

**Here we go! Sorry about delay, Ive been in a sort of cram school during break and have been very tired from it. Also I've got to keep in shape for sports in the** **spring season, so thats been taking up the remainder of my time. This chapter is the longest yet, I I'm quite proud it only took me around 3 hours total to finish.**

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My thoughts halted for just a moment; what did he just say? He wanted to be my partner for the field trip. It was true that we were required to pick a partner to tour the aquarium with, but I had expected it to be Natsu, like always, not Sora! I could feel my cheeks heat up slightly, and I put a hesitant hand to them to cover the little red that showed up. Should I go with him? Granted, I have talked with him before and all, he wasn't a stranger for sure, but then again he wasn't exactly my friend. Still, I couldn't suppress the small bubbles of sinewy elation that seemed to fill my stomach to the brim; I still wasn't sure whether I liked him or not. Wouldn't this be the perfect opportunity to find out?

"Um, sure thing Sora, but just out of curiosity, why me?" I said. After all, he had never shown much interest before.

"Hmmm, I don't really know, I guess you _interest_ me today." he said in that smooth voice of his, sending a weird shiver down my spine. I was incredibly _still_ blushing.

"Sounds good then! Shall we head to the entrance?"

"Sure." he replied, and we headed off towards the destination. As we went, I glimpsed a rather terrifying looking boy, maybe my age, but much bigger. His long, shaggy black hair ran down his back; it accentuated the scowl on his face. His most prominent feature were the numerous piercings in his face. I shuddered a bit, thankfully Sora didn't notice. Just then, I heard a familiar voice.

"LUUUUUCCCYYYY!" yelled Natsu, waving his hand as he waddled over to us. When he finally caught up, I felt a pang of concern as he was huffing pretty hard, supporting his torso by putting his hands on his knees, bent over.

"Ha-you- forgot about- haaha- me and Levy weirdo." he wheezed, obviously not used to that much action. He straightened out finally, looking back once to make sure Levy was following him, but she had already passed by us with Jet and Droy, the two of them arguing over who would get to be her partner while she just tried to calm them down. Natsu then swiveled his eyes back to me, and then, as if only noticing, he eyed Sora, a slight frown on his face, "You're Sora right? What are you doing here?"

"Oh, Lucy and I are going to be partners for the aquarium, right Lucy?"

"Oh-oh, yeah, um, he kinda just asked me just a few minutes ago Natsu." I said, feeling very awkward. The look on Natsu's face was not one that I would be able to ignore; there was a sense of hopelessness in them. We both knew he wouldn't be able to get a partner if Levy and I were both taken; I felt like such an idiot.

"O-oh... um, well uh ok, have fun then Lucy, I'll see ya later!" he put on the best smile he could at that moment, and walked quickly ahead of us, making me feel guilty all over again. I really didn't know what to do; it was pretty selfish of me, but I couldn't disappoint Sora too, especially when my heart and mind were as confused as they were. Natsu still had a hard time approaching other kids, and it was by no means his fault, almost everyone held a grudge against him except me and Levy; the others simply did not care either way, but I knew if he _did_ try to talk them, they would shun him too.

"Well let's go then." Sora said, breaking me from my thoughts; he, boldly in my opinion, gently took my hand and started to head again for the main entrance. No other boy had ever held my hand except for Natsu; wow, I was certainly accomplishing a lot of _firsts_ today wasn't I? I saw a passel of people all vying to get into the aquarium before each other, some even pushing and shoving slightly. The teachers that were chaperoning were each waiting patiently at the entrance, trying not to look irritated about the throes of bodies jostling them around every second.

A rather old and grumpy looking 3rd grade teacher named Mr. Ilsaad thrust out his hand as Sora and I walked up to him, presenting us with two tickets. We gleefully grabbed them and rushed into the lobby, all thoughts of a certain glum pinkhead gone from my mind due to excitement. There were people everywhere, walking the corridors and aisles of the huge interior. I glanced up and saw the same thing repeating for about 4 floors above us, able to make out the different floors of the place. I didn't know where I wanted to go first. I was skeptical before, but now I was filled with elation like a balloon is filled with helium; it was bursting out.

"Come on, let's go see the dolphins first!" Sora said, leading me to a raised platform on the first floor. Each area in the aquarium had a neat looking entrance, adorned with models and pictures of what we could hope to see inside. In this case there was a cool video about dolphins and their high intelligence, the screen was even touch-sensitive! Sora and I played around a bit with it, but of course the main attraction eventually persuaded us to see the real deal.

The dolphins were flipping and swishing about in the water, some zooming past each other while others played with beachballs at the surface. Their joy was infectious, and soon I was laughing out loud as I watched them, mesmerized by their grace and playfulness. I looked back at Sora to see if he was enjoying this as much as me, and instead found him staring at me with a small smile on his face. I bashfully steered my head back to the water, no point denying it now, maybe I _did_ like him; it didn't feel so bad after all.

Sora dragged me along to just about every attraction that caught our eyes, sea lions, sting rays, sharks; the only thing we hadn't seen yet were the whales, but the teachers had promised us that they had booked the whole show for the trip at around two'o-clock. Checking my watch, I noticed we still had a good half-hour until then. In all the delirium over the aquarium, I had totally forgotten about my own friends. Feeling a little guilty, I asked Sora if he wanted to go to cafeteria for lunch, secretly hoping I would see Natsu there.

To no surprise at all, I saw my best friend stuffing himself with pie and cake at a small table in the corner, away from scrutinizing eyes. I told Sora to go ahead and buy something and cautiously approached Natsu, not sure if he was till upset.

"H-hey Natsu... slow down a little will ya? Igneel will get mad at you for puking again ya know." I said, trying for some humor. I mean, it was one thing to inhale food, but Natsu simply vacuumed it when he was on a roll, like he was now.

He gave a start and looked up, face morphing with gall, and went back to eating, "Oh, it's just you. Why aren't you with pretty-boy over there?"

That hurt a bit, "Oh,... he's just getting food. Anyway, who did you find for a partner, was there anyone left or...?" I trailed off.

Natsu shook his head roughly, "Nope, there actually _was_ one person though. A girl, I think her name was Destia? Well, she basically ran as fast as she could away from me as soon as I said hi, so... yeah. How's your day been going?" He was obviously in a bad mood. The only times when he wasn't smiling were when he was either extremely hungry or extremely upset, and it didn't take a genius to figure out which of those he was right now.

"Listen Natsu, I'm sorry it turned out like this, I really didn't expect Sora to ask me to be his partner today, and I was really shocked when it happened so I was a kind of at a loss for words, and... I don't know, maybe I wanted to get to know him better."

Natsu chuckled, "Lucy, I'm not mad. I'm used to being alone during school, remember? You and Levy are the only ones who care enough, and that's fine with me." he was smiling now, and so was I a little bit, "I couldn't ask for better and I'm happy I've got two great friends... you especially."

I beamed at him, "Aaawww, is that a blush I see!"

"Shut up!" he said, all nicety forgotten as he raised his hands to cover and furiously rub his cheeks, "It was probably ketchup or something."

I laughed a bit, amazed at his ability to make me do so, "Are we good now? At least you're smiling again, it's weird seeing you with a frown on your face, it doesn't suit you."

"Yeah we're good, now go and have lunch with your little date." he teased, torpidly pointing his hand towards where Sora was sitting, peering around for what me presumably.

My face heated a bit, "Not a date, but thank you I _will_." I said, making Natsu laugh again. I turned and went to the table Sora had sat down at and plopped myself down in the seat across from him, "What'd you get for lunch?"

"Some turkey subs and fries, since I don't really know what you like I just got something normal."

Saying thanks, I took my sub and bit down, starting to chew. I had really begun to like deli-food more recently, especially as mama had introduced me to the foodstuffs after my first ballet lesson last year. Ballet really works up my appetite and it became a sort of custom for mama and I to go out for some deli after practice. Natsu of course, more often than not, hijacked our trips like the little spaz he is. I had once jokingly asked him if he wanted to start taking some lessons with me, to which he had vehemently refused and even slapped my head for asking him such a thing. That of course caused a fight that ended with me pinning him down, straddling his balloon-like stomach. Actually, Natsu had started to play soccer during the third grade. It really hadn't helped his metabolism at all, but at least he acquired a skill. According to Igneel he was actually pretty good at it, seeming to have some natural technique and skill, he was just way out of shape and really slow, and the other kids on his team often shouted at him for it; no surprise there of course. Still, I kept hoping maybe him playing a sport would make the other kids at school let up on him a bit, but they still shunned him, and pricks like Sting and his gang still terrorized him almost daily. Sometimes I wondered how he handled it all, I knew he was extrinsically tough, but in the tomb of his soul he was an emotional person, often thinking with his sprit rather than his brain.

"You certainly eat quietly." Sora said with a slight smirk, cutting off my inner musings. His playful fleer gave me a sudden interest in my fries, my eyes wanting to look anywhere but his piercing gaze.

"I was just thinking about something." I mumbled.

"Was it about that fat pink-haired kid you were talking to? What's his name, Fatsu?" Sora asked offhandedly. Now normally I would have been extremely upset at that, but I told myself that, if everybody else talked about Natsu that way, why should Sora have been any different?

"Yeah, I was just feeling bad that I left _Natsu_ alone today, he's my friend you know."

His face gave a small jolt, "Oh sorry, I didn't know that." he apologized, but he didn't sound very regretful. We went back to a hollow silence while eating, the air around us a little tense, but I was determined to find out what this feeling meant, the way it mad my stomach flutter; it reminded me of that sinking feeling you had when went down a roller coaster.

I finally put the crust from my sandwich down and wiped my mouth with my napkin, peering over my head to check on Natsu, but he had already left. Frowning slightly, I turned my head back to Sora, who smiled at me, then got up to throw his food away. Right as he was about to sit down again, Mrs. Helraphia, the teacher in charge signaled in her loudspeaker that it was at last time for the whale show.

It took place in a large outdoor amphitheater, an oval entrance leading into a grand set of stairs that reminded me of a coliseum. The stone stairs had five alternating rows that each lead to a higher row, each with foldable seats, conjuring images of an opera house that mama and had taken me too once. Except this vista was _much_ larger. A fountain at the base cascaded green colored water down its many layers, as it flowed brightly into the drain underneath; really it was a beautiful sight. I fumbled with my bag and ascended the stairs with Sora in tow, I made out Sting in the sea of heads, it was like spotting an orange in a field of apples. _Insolent prick._ His stupid posse had gotten bigger and there was this one kid who always followed him around, Rogue; I don't know what the deal was between the two of them but they were very close. Rogue was a much quieter kid than Sting, but nonetheless he said nor felt _nothing_ as Sting bullied other kids into submission. Just thinking about those two jerks had my blood boiling.

I started a bit of small talk with Sora to take my mind off of things for now. We talked about likes, dislikes, generic stuff like that. I told him about mama a little, he in turn me some stories about his little brother. He then stunned me by casually asking me if I liked anyone. All of a sudden my breathing quickened and face paled, and I felt the inexplicable need to tell him _something_ , anything really. I almost did too.

"Listen, Sora I-"

But my confession, if I could call it that, was cut short as Ms. Helraphia announced in her mega-phone that the whale show was about to start. A reverberating cheer went around the arena. It echoed across the acoustical area and created a daunting effect. The gigantic pool in front of us was vast in my mind to say the least, it looked the very sea itself had gone and transported itself right in front of me; I suddenly felt really insignificant in the face of the sheer _mass_ of water that was staring at me and the humongous creatures that inhabited it.

The killer whales surfaced to a loud carousal, some kids were even standing up to the disdain of the teachers. The animals clashed and splashed around in the water, occasionally resurfacing to interact with their human trainers; it was really impressive. Sometimes, when the whales dived back in, it would create a huge wave of water and mist, and we got soaked to our obvious delight and shrieks.

In all that enjoyment and excitement, it was hard to recall later how it all fell apart.

I remember it all started when one of the whales accidentally hurtled itself into the glass wall that separated it from us. I don't think it was trained to do that but it happened nonetheless. The trainers looked panicked for a moment, but it alleviated once they thought everything was fine. That was when some of the kids in the front started to scream that they could see water running out of the glass, as if there was a crack. That started widespread delirium as everybody started shouting and screaming at the top of their lungs, some people even going as far as sprinting out of the arena. Sora and I were too high up to do anything at the moment, but I just hoped that Natsu was safe. Ms. Helraphia and Mr. Ilsaad were rapidly conversing with the aquarium staff off to the side, even they looked afraid, lost in the pandemonium.

Immediately, there was a clanger that resounded across the stadium, and for one moment, everyone was silent, then I watched with horror, as more and more cracks became visible along the glass; this could not be happening, there was no way I was this unlucky. The teachers had already started telling everyone to head for the exits. The kids weren't listening at all, there were too busy running. The trainers had already disappeared, shuffling the whales back into their cages. There was a mad mob trying to get down the stairs, scared for their very lives by now.

"Lucy we have to get out of here!" Sora shouted above the clamor.

"Right, let's go." I made to go after him but something held me back; my stupid skirt was caught in the seat! It had jammed! I furiously pulled at it, feeling the seams give a little, but they still didn't budge. Sora came to help me and we pulled and pulled, desperation increasing. The seat would not budge no matter what we tried. I chanced shifting my leg into a wedge of sorts so I could use it as a fulcrum to rip the cloth, but it still didn't work.

As this was happening, the cracks were getting bigger and the number of people in the room was getting smaller and smaller, but there were still some stragglers like us, as there was a huge buildup near the exits. The mixture of kids and adults pooled together in one collective heap, everyone caring about their own lives. In a fit of mercy I spotted a tiny pixie with blue hair, _thank god_ , it looked like Levy would get out okay. My own fate was a whole other case.

Sora was grunting with the exertion that our problems was causing. All the while, the ominous slushing and crashing of the water on the glass, like waves against a rocky cliff, just dying to get out, sent my blood churning. I had never felt such absolute _terror_ before in my life.

The final crack made a sound like a shotgun, sending a gust of air and whirlwind around the area with the sheer force that it took to cause the breakage. I was pulling as I hard as I could still, desperation fueling my attempts. Suddenly, I felt Sora's fingers soften little on my skirt. I turned around to look at him in frightened bewilderment.

"S-Sora?"

He said nothing, just gave me what I suppose was an apologetic look, and slowly backed away and, in what I could only interpret to be a chimerical display of frantic self preservation, turned heel and ran, ran like the wind itself.

Tears came to my eyes. My hands were still pathetically pulling at my skirt, but it was no use. I was really going to die here wasn't I? A victim of the terror known as water. Huge volumes of water began bubbling up behind the fissure on the glass, and I knew that soon the whole wall would break due to the tension that was being placed on it.

It broke.

Then and there, I experienced _true_ fear. The water seemed to transform before my eyes, into a gargantuan monster, and I was but an ant to it. It could crush me in its sleep, slaughter me. I stared up at the monster, darkened by the its shadow as it loomed over me like the harbinger of death. Wind whipped at my hair, and mist surrounded my body, soaking me from head to toe.

This was it, I was actually about to die; there was so much I still wanted to do.

I waited for it, time seemed to slow to a crawl in that moment, as if the universe was mocking me by making me suffer through misery longer than I should have. I felt the enormous pressure of the water before it hit me, crushing me before it even touched me. My mind was rapidly going into overdrive, and I think I started to hyperventilate, shock slowly working its way though my veins.

Reminiscing mama's face in my head brought an ironic smile to face. If this was how I was going to leave this world, it might as well have been while remembering all my friends and family. I recalled Levy, so sweet and nice, the sister I never had. And then, there was Natsu, that big, pink idiot that was also my best friend, I didn't want to think what happen to him if I left.

As I breathed what I assumed to be my last breaths, I closed my eyes and awaited the inevitable infinite wetness that was about hit me, about to envelop me in the power of nature and the earth. Five seconds, four seconds, three, two... one...

It never came.

All I heard was a huge tearing sound, as if something had been ripped right in half. I felt big and chubby arms grab my by my hands, and felt my body thrown over a lumpy shoulder.

I saw pink.

Natsu. Natsu had stayed behind, looking for me. That idiot had risked his life to save my stupid one.

"Don't worry Lucy! We'll get out off this!" he hollered.

"You shouldn't have come up here idiot, now we're both gonna die!

My pleas fell deaf on his ears, like always. The water had crashed into the spot where I had been stuck in only moments before, but Natsu had come in, ripped the cloth with what I assumed to be sheer adrenaline and willpower, and then half-carried me to the highest row, saving us for another few minutes. Waves and ripples from the tank roared around us, as if we were two pirates trying to navigate a ship through a raging sea.

"Come on, if we climb up that storm drain gutter, we can make it to the roof and escape the water!" Natsu yelled madly.

"We'll never be able to climb there!"

"We won't know 'till we try right?"

I groaned, but raced after him as he waddled as fast as he could towards the gutter. It was perched maybe two feet to the side of the highest seating row, and lead to the roof of the aquarium. I skidded to a stop right behind Natsu, when he turned around and looked me expectantly, like he wanted _me_ to go first!

"No, Natsu Dragneel! You listen here, you have to go first, I'm not leaving you behind to die!"

"Lucy! I'm not playing around right now! Does it look like I'm not completely serious?!" he asked, a hard look in his eyes that I had never seen before; they made me shudder a little.

Reluctantly I jumped to the gutter and became to climb up, all those years climbing the jungle gym pole at recess finally coming on handy. Natsu was right behind me, and when I got to the top, he was still climbing, now exerting a lot of energy because he weighed considerably more than me, and had to use a lot more of his muscles to move up the gutter.

The water was lapping at his shoes, one of them fell off. His hold was slipping, and he couldn't seem to be able to muster the last push to the top.

 _No._ I was _not_ going to lose him in such a stupid way. A fierce fire lit in me and I jumped into action, grabbing ahold of his hand as soon as he squandered his last bit of strength, and almost fell to the chaos below. I pulled him up and into my arms, where he lay shivering.

It was over.

I couldn't believe it; this dense, _reckless_ idiot had come to my rescue, when everyone else had abandoned me to my fate, he had come to save me. I would have to have talk with him later about theses cavalier impulses of his, but for now I was content to hold him in my arms, shivering and chattering my teeth along with him. I guess you really know who your real friends are when it matters most.

Oh, and I never paid a solitary thought to Sora after that day.

* * *

 **Right, so whats new with me? Well, I saw STAR WARS! I loved it, but then again I'm kinda a SW junkie, so don't take my best word for it. I also finished the Millennium Series (The girl with the dragon** **Tattoo), its definitely _not_ for the faint of heart, but it really gets me thinking about things and my life in general; idk it moved me.**

 **Chapter 466 review- so, we see a little bit of everything huh in this chapter? I think that obviously Lucy will save Brandish. Actually, since the spoilers are already out, I can tell you some things, if you don't wanna be a spoiled DONT LOOK DIRECTLY BELOW!**

 **Spoliers 467- so apparently Brandish thinks that Layla killed her mom to take some keys that she gave to Lucy, such as Aquarius. The two fight and Brandish quickly overpowers Lucy, however water gets knocked over and spills on the ground, prompting Aquarius to come out and save Lucy, which was pretty predicable to be honest.**

 **replies:**

 **xxstarsnowxx- yeah, I'm not too fond of OC's either, its hard to not mary sue them or not to make them irrelevant. And, you should really** **read the Naruto manga, I like it better than the anime, but the anime has better animation now than it did around episode 100, sooo... idk**

 **CelestialTitania- yeah thats sort of the basis, I hope you liked the inclusion, of course Lucy will not look natsus way as of now, theres only so much physical stuff the eyes can overcome**

 **Rose Tiger- I am!**

 **HannaG123- I Pm'd you before, but yeah thats just me on tumblr.**

 **\- oh no its not that dramatic, _yet._**

 **Sareena- oh he did something** **alright! Im just building the plot rn**

 **Doublepass- I think i follow you actually, I'm fioranpsycho**

 **lumencreates- lets hope so...**

 **laxusdreyar2324- now we know!**

 **AngelEmCuti- it won't be her first crush either**

 **Astroman1000- thx**

 **Kat the Neeko- haha that's** **hilarious! I have a cousin who's life actually sounds eerily a lot like yours XD, except she's like 13**

 **Fuckingawsome123- Oh don't worry, shell have other crushes**

 **Dolphilover303- we'll see how the manga plays out**

 **Anonymous Person- actually their in fifth**

 **Butterfree- thank you! I appreciate you seeing what I have in mind**

 **Flamexocxchaos- thx, you too!**


	20. A New Terror

**HAPPY BELATED NEW YEAR! Here is the next chapter, I hope the wait wasnt too long, I did have a busy break, but more on that later. We are slowly moving into the main focus of the story, the timeskip is nearing, but quite a few characters still have to be introduced. You will also notice that with age, the personality and the language of the characters will change (Im kinda drawing from my own experience in that regard)**

* * *

Tick-tick-tick-tock...

I raised my head from under my arms to take a peek at the clock, and then dropped it back down with a groan. 30 freaking minutes!? We had been at this test for an hour already, but it seemed like class would never end. Oh how I wished I could go back to the super easy tests we used to have in elementary school. Middle school is straight hell. I entered it with all these expectations but it's just a hodgepodge of pre-teens, huge dudes, and tiny kids. It's so _different_ from before, our grades actually _mattered_ this time, and the workload was insane! Even the teachers all acted like they had a stick up their butts or something, as if there was something different in the water here.

I turned my head to the left to spot a furiously concentrating Natsu sweating absolute bullets. I sighed because I had _told_ him to study for this test, but as usual he hadn't listened; honestly, you'd think that by now, after three C's in a row, he would learn, but no, he insisted that he was simply too _smart_ to study; idiot. Why couldn't he be more like me and Levy. I mean, I didn't exactly live and breath school, but I was pretty smart compared to the others, and I've been able to keep up with my grades pretty well, much to my father's delight (more like his _only_ delight). Levy on the other hand, she was an absolute _demon,_ when it came to reading and studying anyway. She was always getting near perfect scores on all assortments of test, quizzes, projects, you name it. Most of the time we did our homework together and it benefited the both of us. We always asked Natsu to read with us, but it usually deteriorated into full-on pillow fights between the three of us, which wasn't exactly good for our GPA.

Levy, also finished with her test, and who was sitting behind me in my silent musings, poked my head and whispered in my ear, "Should we be worried him?" She nodded at Natsu, "I mean, he's not even halfway through, and the bell's gonna ring in another half-hour."

I suppressed a groan, "I _told_ him to study! He always does this too, just last week he totally blew off the lit quiz!"

"Sh-should we help him?" Levy asked timidly, afraid she might have said too much.

"What!? No! Levy, he deserves it. He came over to my house just last night to _study_ , and he ended up eating all the ice-cream in my fridge and _then_ he threw some at me, and well, you know me, I couldn't just let him get _away_ with it, so I threw some back and... you can probably guess the rest."

She smothered a giggle and looked at me with an almost fond look that surprised me, "Oh, you two. I don't think I've ever seen anyone else as close as you and him."

"Oh shut up Levy, he's my oldest friend, of course we'll be close to each other."

"Well I mean, you and I are pretty close Lu, but there's just _something_ between you and Natsu that I can't place." Levy said with a faraway look in her eye.

Seeing as how I didn't want to board the delusional Levy train anytime soon, I turned back around to my own desk and went back to sleeping, or at least _pretending_ to sleep. Our teacher, Mr. Calinth, was not too fond of people looking around during tests; it was a wonder Levy and I had been able to even get out as much as a peep.

Really, this wasn't the first time Levy had teased me about Natsu, don't get me wrong, I loved him to bits, he was my closest and best friend, and I even owed him my very _life_ but... I just wasn't _in_ love with him, not even "in like" really. I couldn't _force_ myself to like someone, it just wasn't possible. Yeah, I had made a mistake with Sora back then, but that hadn't stopped me from being attracted to different people since that time; you just can't control your own fickle feelings, it's unnatural. Honestly, there's always a lot of pish-posh about "true love" and all that, I always saw it in books and mama simply _gushed_ over it. But, in my experience, I think your mind is attracted to multiple people at the same time, until it zeroes in on one single person; real life was _very_ different from fiction.

My subconscious was still a convoluted mess of unrequited attraction, confusing signals, and an increasing number of hormones that just added to the distress; being a pre-teen was _really_ confusing. I didn't know if I wanted to be close to someone, or run away screaming. It really gave me a headache sometimes.

A loud, "I'M FINISHED!" interrupted me from my thoughts. I grimaced at Natsu's outburst caused me to jump a little, and a scowling Mr. Calinth watched Natsu like a hawk as he saddled up to his desk to turn in the test. Natsu nervously grinned up the teacher as he carefully placed his paper on top of all the others, beating the bell by a mere minute. He flashed me a smug grin on his way back from the teachers desk.

He didn't see the foot that stuck out right as he passed by the third row of desks, "WHOOOAHH!" Natsu tripped and fell with a resounding thud, catching himself with his plump arms. He got up with a glare for the culprit, an asshole named Bora, who was smiling deviously at Natsu. Calinth was looking around with a scowl.

"Who did that? Whoever did that better show themselves _now_!"

Naturally no one did, and there were even a few snickers as Natsu clumsily dusted himself off. With one last glare, he sat himself back down beside me, fuming, arms crossed. He didn't dare go at Bora in the middle of class; it had happened before and the results had not been pretty at all. The gradual effect of the incident caused a new cacophony of noise to slowly have an inception and the noise that threatened to almost boil over was just saved by the bell, literally.

Natsu got up with a bang and a clutter of papers flew out of his bag, and he proceeded to hurry out the door first. I smirked a little as I saw him try to shove Bora on his way out. I told Levy to head to lunch without me as I wanted to check up on Natsu. I picked up his papers and looked to my left when I stepped out of the classroom, not spotting him. I quickly shuffled down the hall, keeping close to the lockers so I could avoid the throng of people.

By chance, I glanced a mop of spiky, orange hair, and tried not to scream as I silently ducked around the owner of said hair. Ugh, _Loke_ , that creepy stalker. He had seen me the first day of middle school, and immediately _claimed his undying love for me,_ what a creeper. He was good-looking I guess, evidenced by the large number of girls that were always around him, but I tended to stray firmly _away_ from him. Sometimes he acted normal enough and I reluctantly spoke with him, not knowing whether he would be able to carry an almost normal conversation without trying to flirt with me every five seconds!

Fortunately, he didn't see me; score! I craned my neck left and right, still searching for Natsu.

"Hey Lucy, wait up!" I turned and saw a girl jogging towards me, bag in tow, slightly huffing because her bag looked quite heavy. She wiped her short silver hair out of her eyes as she neared me, "Hey, haven't seen you around much lately, what's up?"

"Oh nothing Lissana, you haven't seen Natsu have you?" I interjected quickly.

She frowned, "No, usually I'd recommend looking for you to find him, but hehe, that wouldn't really work now would it?" she grinned sheepishly.

I gave a small grin, "Alright, I'll admit he's usually with me, but that absolute _prick,_ Bora, tripped him at the end of Mr. Calinth's class, and he just stormed out after that!"

"Hmm, I haven't seen him yet today, but just as I left Mrs. Traimsworth's class, I literally saw _two_ kids fall down at the same time, maybe Natsu pushed them?" she suggested with a wry smile.

"That idiot." I grumbled out, shaking my head.

"It's so cute of you to worry over him like that!" she gushed.

"Oh god, you sound just like Levy." I said, groaning, "I repeat, there is nothing like that between me and him. What do I have to do, get a boyfriend or something to get you guys off of my back?!"

"Okay, okay, didn't mean to push." she smiled knowingly, "Anyway, you should go after your _friend_ , he's probably punching a locker right now."

"Right." I answered curtly before hurrying along the corridor. I liked Lissana, like Levy she was really nice, maybe even nicer. As much as they both liked to tease me, Levy unfortunately did it more. Lissana, by no fault of her own, was also not quite as smart as Levy was, but then again, nobody was. I had met her in my math class maybe three months ago, and she had been nice enough to me and Natsu that I went back and talked to her the next day, and that soon formed into an unlikely friendship. I knew she was not an only child, she often talked about her siblings, but I had never seen them.

A loud banging startled me. I turned a corner, and there was Natsu, alone in a hallway, banging on his locker. He banged it again, then tried the combination, and it didn't open.

"Gaaahhh! Stupid locker, freaking open!" he grunted loudly and then proceeded to give it a nice kick that no doubt caused him pain because he immediately clutched his foot in his hand and jumped around.

Trying not to laugh for his sake, I approached him, "Natsu... hey, did you forget your locker combination again you dummy? It's 44, 56, _32_ , not 42 remember?"

"...crap" he muttered, lying on the ground and still clutching his foot.

I made to open it for him, but he stopped me, "Nah, I got it." He lamely opened it, with a brunt lethargy.

"..."

"Do you want to talk about it?" I addressed the elephant in the room, or the _hall_ in this case

"No." he scoffed.

"Come on, we both know Bora's a prick, we just have to forget about it."

"You mean _I_ have to forget about it."

"That's not fair and you're making this any easier either." I argued with some venom, bending down to gently ease his foot out of his shoe and examining it, "You should go the nurse."

"Don't need to." he groaned, limping to a stand. He started to walk away.

"It's lunch, where are you going?"

"I just want to eat alone today ok?" Natsu mumbled with his back towards me, while he limped off the back of the school. I hate it when he got like this, not seeing that smile on his face breaks my heart sometimes. I thought that when we entered middle school, the bullying would ease a bit since there were a lot more kids here. Wrong. Stupid Sting and his little gang only grew in popularity, and with that so did the tormenting of _Fatsu_ , the name we both wished would just go the hell away. I sometimes talked with mama about my concerns and she would always get a stony look on her face, and immediately went to call Igneel, but I never knew what they talked about. Not like it mattered, mama was barely in the house anymore, and whenever I saw her, she would have a gaunt look on her face, as if she had insomnia. She was really puzzling me lately.

Just then I saw Jet and Droy walking along, "Lucy, there you are, Levy wants you to come eat lunch."

"Yeah, I was on my way." I said somberly and we made our way to the cafeteria, Jet and Droy cracking jokes to each other on the way.

I had to look around for a bit before I could spot Levy, the place was _huge_ after all. 60 or so tables lined up and down a huge room that looked like the inside of a warehouse, with huge rectangular windows on either side, the ceiling at least 60 feet in the air with fluorescent lighting. We walked along the tiled, white floor to Levy; I sat down and the other two went to go get a school lunch.

"Hey." I said.

"Hey yourself, everything good with Natsu?"

"Not really." I channered, "He's in one of those rare moods where he just has to _be alone._ "

"To be fair to him, it looked like it hurt."

"He's fine." I waved off with my hand, it took more than that to rattle him.

"If you say so." Levy sighed, "It just feels like a dark cloud is above our heads all the time, and that it could rain at any moment, you know what I mean?"

"That's an understatement." I said darkly.

We sat in silence for a bit, not really up for small talk. Eventually Levy made the first move.

"I gotta go and turn in my geology project to Ms. Velaria, see you later." she started, and got up breathing a little lightly as she ambled towards the exit."

I watched her go with a mixture of regret and amusement. Jet and Droy came back to a Levy-less table, to which they were none too happy about. Jet sat down grumpily and began subtly but angrily attacking his tater-tots with a fork.

"So Jet, trying out for track?" I asked, trying to pacify his anger with some small talk. I knew he was a really fast sprinter.

"I dunno, I might not have the stamina for it."

"But you _are_ the fastest kid in our grade, and I'm sure you can get some stamina from training." I countered.

He shifted uncomfortably, "Maybe, but-"

I didn't hear the rest of his answer because the air was pierced by a shriek that could only belong to Levy. My blood curdled as I turned to the exit door slowly, when I heard it again. That's all it took for me to race out there and help my friend. I was met with the terrifying image of a broken looking Levy sprawled on the ground near some lockers, breathing heavily while she clutched her stomach. I slowly looked up in pure trepidation to see the face of the scariest kid in school, Gajeel Redfox.

He met my fearful gaze with a hard look, and then, as if realizing the growing crowd, took off, escaping from his sin.

* * *

 **Whew, there we go. The shift in language will continue cuz we all know teens cuss like sailors. I might change rating to M later for maybe language and other stuff, but for now its strictly T. I hope you all like this chapter, not as long, but the plot has moved a bit and a few more characters were introduced.**

 **Last chapter got nearly 30 reviews! I can't believe it, I hope everyone enjoys this chapter too! Sorry for any inconsistency in updates btw, the way I operate is that I'll be so busy that I won't get to gradually write a chapter like I know most people do. I dint really have this story pre-written either, obviously, so each chapter was probably conceived in the 4 hours before the update time, lol**

 **FT Chapter 468 review (manga spoilers)- It was expected, but I'm really curious to see what happens with Natsu!**

 **Personal anecdote- LOLX1000 for this story. I haven't done one of these in a while, lemme know if anyone wants them more frequently. So a lot of crazy has happened since my last little personal story. It was a fairly good school semester, I got all A's, hallelujah, and my soccer team got into the top division for our age group, so that was cool. ****Anyway here it is: right around the start of break, I was at a party with my soccer mates, and it was going like usual, everyone was either buzzed or high by about 10:00-12, and we were just chilling, when all of a sudden one of them just gets up and yells out that we're gonna play beer pong, naturally everyone follows suit like idiots, so before I know it, we're all smashed, but that's not the worst part. One of them, let's just call him Bob rn, dipped for the first time that night, and that coupled with about 8 bud lights and some shots are enough to make him throw up all over the floor! He wobbles to the toilet and literally passes out with his head in the bowl lol, still vomiting! So that leaves me and this other dude, still drunk out of our minds, left to clean up his shit with some cleenex and latex gloves! Let's just say I had never before been so intimate with vomit. If I was sober I probably would have lost my cookies myself, thank god for that. The next morning, he looked like _absolute_ shit! XD**

 **replies:**

 **nico2883- thx, and yeah it does take a lot for Lucy to be jealous (i assume that's what u meant?)**

 **ftx777x- yeah almost dying does redeem stuff huh? XD**

 **Sareena- aw thanks, you always leave nice reviews! I hope u like this chapter. Also, just wait and see. Happy New Year as well!**

 **Guest- I'm confused**

 **Guest- Happy new year to you too, Sora is somewhat a hidden prick, but he's just a plot device**

 **Fumiya65- oh you will have to wait and see Natsu's fate :)**

 **Rose Tiger- yeah, it's time I pumped some adrenaline into this story a bit more**

 **\- thanks!**

 **Butterfree- Thank you, that's what I hoped to do after all**

 **AngelEmCuti- hope you like this chapter**

 **Kat the Neeko- parents are an enigma :) Happy new year to you too, I'm glad you like the plot** **development.**

 **Ms. Cookiesmuggler- That's what I went for, intense, that's probably one of the rare times the style of the writing will shift more into my other style that I employed in my other story Ancient Outlook. And how was Star Wars if you watched it?**

 **laxusdreyar2324- Yep, NAtsu to the rescue, and that last chapter there were in fifth grade.**

 **BraveartemisKnight- yep Poor natsu. But remember Lucy is still young and naive about her emotions.**

 **Nega Kris- glad you think so, if you have any feedback Its always welcome!**

 **Dark Mystique- Thanks!**

 **Dolphinlover303- yeah, I was going for "she was so panicky that she couldn't think", idk. Also happy new year! I don't think Lucy will send anyone back, because there's no reason to at the moment. Some think a kiss will happen in the new movie, but maybe don't get your hopes up too high.**

 **FranFranwriter- I think i was gong more for, in all that panic, the teachers missed Lucy stuck up there, as well, the fact that they were about to die, idk. I myself haven't carried scissors since middle school XD**

 **FTfanatic777- I updated!**

 **JokeLover123- well, I'm glad my OC had the intended effect :)**

 **Riley- thanks, but I'm far from a perfect writer :)**

 **Maidenoftheluminousrapture- yeah, love needs more building blocks than just that. New FT chapter is out**

 **xxstarsnowxx- yep, I always like Naruto manga better than anime, but the movies are all class. Sorry about updates, Iv'e had soccer conditionng :(**


	21. Plan of Attack

Shock spread through my body like a wildfire, making my bones shiver and my mind blank. I vaguely reached my hand out, as if testing it was still there. A quick shuffle of feet behind me alerted me to the presence of Jet and Droy, who had both raced out of the cafeteria behind me. Jet pushed past me with some urgency, and immediately went to kneel down beside Levy, who's body was still spasming from aftershock. Droy simply stood beside me, mouth agape, silently watching the increasingly larger crowd that was surrounding Levy. The nurse came over and gently played Levy down on a stretcher while another teacher held it. They quickly shuttled her to the clinic, leaving me alone with Jet and Droy.

"Who was it?" Droy asked in a course whisper. It took me a few seconds to register what he was saying, and my mind suddenly flitted back to that pair of red eyes; they seemed to bore into my soul.

"Gajeel... it was Gajeel Redfox."

"Redfox!?" Droy exclaimed, "What was Levy doing around _him_ of all people?"

"I'm not actually sure, but whatever the reason, someone needs to get to the bottom of this."

Jet had been listening in on our conversation, and when he stood back up, he had an ugly look on his face, "That bastard, where is he!? I'll make him pay for hurting Levy!"

Immediately I waved my hands to calm him down, "Jet, that is _not_ a good idea at all. Have you _seen_ Gajeel? He's at least a good two feet taller than you, and he's got the strength to match." It was well known that Gajeel was a very talented wrestler; he even did a little bit of boxing.

"I don't care!" snarled Jet, "He has to pay for it, did you see her!?" he gestured to Levy was taken away, "She didn't even know what was going on!"

"Jet, I am sure there is a very logical reason for why this happened, but that does _not_ mean you an just go after Gajeel acting like some sort of crazy person!"

His response was drowned by a very loud, "Hey Lucy!" curtesy of Natsu. He wondered over, surprisingly with a smile on his face, uninformed about the recent drama that just happened. Jet scowled at him, and Droy gave him a dirty look.

"Whoa, what's got you two down in the dumps? Is this because I snapped at Lucy before, because I am _over_ that now." he said with a laugh. When, he got no reaction, his expression hardened and he turned towards me looking for an answer.

"What's going on Lucy?" he said with a worried tone.

"Uh, Levy um... Levy was, I guess you could say, _injured_ by Gajeel Redfox"

"WHAT! Where is that bastard, I'm gonna kill him!" I winced at his voice.

"Natsu, that is to a good idea at all, as I already told Jet. We just need to calm down and find out what happened with Levy."

Natsu huffed but said nothing further and he curtly nodded. The nurse soon came out to tell us that we could see Levy now. I composed myself as I could and lightly followed Natsu into the room.

The cool air of the nurse's office hit my face and felt refreshing. There was monitor at the back of the room, adorned by cite pictures of the nurse's children. The bed right next to it currently housed Levy, who was sitting up but still looked to be in some pain. Jet and Droy had already crowded the bed in an attempt to make sure that their friend was alright. I seriously wonder sometimes why the smartest girl in our grade can't even figure out that her two best guy friends both have major crushes on her; go figure.

Levy's mouth widened when she turned and saw me, "Lucy, and Natsu too, hey guys!"

"Hey Levy... how you feeling?"

"Much better now that the nurse gave me some pain medication, though my legs are still a bit sore." she admitted; Natsu glowered at that.

"What exactly did that asshole do?" Natsu said with a grim face sobering up Jet and Droy's happy expressions pretty quickly. I can't say I was pleased at the immediate shift in topic, I hadn't wanted to yet talk about Gajeel Redfox.

"Oh, Natsu... it's nothing really, just a small scra-" Levy timidly tried to say before Natsu cut her off.

"Don't give me that crap Levy! I want the truth, and all of it."

Levy cowered under Natsu's hardened gaze; he was rarely like this, but when he was, it was like he was a complete different person. She closed her eyes for a few seconds and took a deep breath to calm herself.

"When.. when I left the cafeteria, I uh, I saw Gajeel.. he was leaning into a locker, looked like maybe he was getting something? I don't know. Anyway, he was looking all over the place, as if he had something to hide. Bottom line, he looked pretty suspicious. All _I_ did was ask him what he was doing, and he suddenly turns on me with wild eyes. I'm telling you guys this right now, eyes don't lie, and his told me that he was _very_ afraid of something."

"Afraid of what?" I asked, intrigued.

"No way of knowing is there? All I could figure out was that he was probably in some kind of trouble, maybe I even thought of wanting to help him.." she sighed. Levy really was too nice for her own good sometimes.

"The only thing I could make out from a quick glimpse was a bag full of packets, and... it looked like there was powder in them. After that it was all a blur and I was on the ground, clutching my knees." Levy said solemnly. Jet, Droy, and I looked around wearily, eyeing each other. Natsu, not catching on to the subtle hint, looked around at all of us in confusion.

"What are you weirdos looking so sad for? It was only powder wasn't it?"

"Natsu... she, she means that-"

"She means he had drugs with him you idiot!" Jet interjected.

The harsh reality hit Natsu's eyes, and he looked back at me, "Why would he have drugs? I thought those were bad for you." he said in a genuinely innocent voice. Despite the gravity of the situation, I cracked a smile; Natsu could be adorably misinformed sometimes.

"Listen here, just because something is bad for you, doesn't mean other people still won't do it. Like.. Igneel for example drinks doesn't he?"

Natsu crossed his arms and nodded, "Yeah, but he only does that when he goes out those secret _parties_ that he never tells me about."

"Exactly," I said, "he still does it, even though it's technically bad for him, though I guess a lot of other people do too."

Natsu looked like he understood then made a valid point, "Igneel does drink, but he never drinks like a lot. But it looks like Gajeel had a boatload of whatever drug that was."

"That means it's not all for him." Jet said, "It could mean that he wasn't even using any of it at all; he was transporting it, or worse selling!"

"Hang on," said Levy, " how do we even know that he has any part in this, he could be being manipulated for all we know." Leave it Levy to see good in the dude who beat her up.

Droy seemed to share my musings, "Yeah right, he probably _does_ the drugs and sells them too, have you _seen_ the kids he hangs out with?"

He had a point, Gajeel was a grade above us and most of his friends were in the eighth grade. One look at them meant bad news, and there were nasty rumors swirling around that some of them were smokers. I didn't know how much truth there was to it, but if his friends were involved with drugs, then Gajeel likely was too.

"In any case, what should we do?" I asked, looking around, "Should we tell the teachers or the cops or what?"

Natsu looked like he wanted to say something, he even huffed in an attempt to let it all out in one really big breath, but then a look of skepticism passed his eyes, and he ensued in an admittedly hilarious internal struggle that showed up on his face via comedic expressions. Jet on the other hand looked like he wanted to say something too, only bolder, but was too afraid of Levy to say it, which made him look like he was about to puke.

Levy broke the uncomfortable silence, "I-I don't think we should tell anybody for no-"

"Levy you can't seriously expect us to go along with that!" shouted Jet as Natsu and Droy nodded their agreement.

"Listen to me!" Levy said, leaning forward off the bed, "We have absolutely no idea the circumstances around this whole situation, whatever it is! It's safer not too assume anything just yet; all we know is that Gajeel is out there somewhere with a bag full of some drug or another. We don't know if he's the victim or not in this situation."

"Redfox looks anything _but_ a victim." Jet muttered while rolling his eyes. I only stayed silent; it was a peculiar spot to be in for sure, but I wanted to go along with whatever Levy did, because she was the one most embroiled in this mess; suddenly an idea struck me.

"Hey about this, since school's almost over anyway, after, the four of us will search for Gajeel, and try to figure this out, _then_ we can decide whether or not to tell the police."

"I don't know Lucy, it sounds kinda dumb." Natsu said bluntly. I huffed at him and balled my fists.

"What else can we do? We're the only ones who know what Gajeel has on him and there's already a search out for him since he fled school; if someone else finds him before us, it means big trouble for him."

" _So_ ," Jet scoffed, "Why should we care what happens to that douchebag, he beat up Levy!" I frowned at Jet but he only shrugged; it was typical that they would think like this, but this more than just about Levy, this was a mystery, and something in me was aching to solve it.

"I agree with Lucy actually." Natsu said, surprising me, "No matter what he did to Levy, I think we should give him a chance to explain, especially since he's never picked fights with a girl before. Plus I think it'll be fun!"

Wow, Natsu could actually be mature sometimes, or so I thought as he proceeded to pretend to choke himself with his scarf, earning a snicker from Droy.

"Stop that Natsu. Anyway, now that we can seem to somewhat agree, do we have a plan?"

"Of course!" said Levy. Jet and Droy were a little more hesitant, but they finally gave in.

"Fine, can't say I'm not a little interested in exactly why and how it happened." Jet said and Droy nodded.

This was good, we had a plan, all we had to do now was actually _do_ it.

* * *

 **Whew, thank you all for those kind messages, they really meant a lot. My physical therapy is coming along well and it no longer hurts to be able to type, so yay!**

 **On another note, this is the third to last chapter before the timeskip, so after this, two more and we go to the future!**

 **FT chapter 474 SPOILERS!-**

 **So I liked it, even though I** **thought the LAxus fight was pretty BS, is it alright to say I wanted WAhl to win? I loved the nalu in this chapter tho! Ultra's bacbk too! Not too sure on what to feel on that yet, and it looks like Lyon's got a new bae lol. Jellal coming back is the big thing in this chapter, but I'm not sure he'll be able to defeat Zeref.**

 **replies:**

 **sorry I did not have time to do replies from chapter 20, only the chapter 21 note , again sorry, I'll get back on them by next chapter**

 **JokeLover123- ah sorry for false alarm. I hope my shoulder gets well soon too, I wanna play soccer again!**

 **FranFranWriter- thank you!**

 **Ket the neeko- thanks! you like Attack on titan too? Wish I had a cat :( oh well. Did you actually say that to the gym teacher? lol sass. if you ever got an FF account, would it also be called the Kat the neeko? Mystery :)**

 **guest- ah, thank you!**

 **\- thank you! I definitely am feeling a bit better by now.**

 **AngelEmCuti- thanks, i wanna play again really bad :(**

 **Hul- Hope the wait wasn't too long**

 **flamexofxchaos- thanks! I love writing for you guys**

 **ohbeans- oh thank you!**

 **BlackDragonRAyu- thanks!**


	22. Extortion

Extortion

"All clear." Levy said, as she peered around the corner of our school building. There was a door near the back end of the class that was always open for some reason. The five of us slowly filed out of the building, creeping along the alley like a snake. We huddled near a street lamp, making sure the passing guard didn't spot us, and then were were off, racing under the sun to the nearest cafe. Once inside, Levy took charge.

"Alright, you guys wait here, I'm gonna go ask if anyone saw Gajeel when he burst out of school."

"Alright, be careful Levy." I said. I watched as she nodded and turned, heading straight out. She was back in about ten minutes or so, looking grave.

"Ok, I just asked an old woman who said she was sitting on the bench near the front yard. Pretending to be his friend, I asked her about him. She said said she saw a black-haired boy with red eyes running out of school, obviously Gajeel. The thing is, he it seems like he just sprinted towards the city."

I squirmed a bit. The city was not a place for kids, even if that kid was a giant, "Should we still look for him, I mean, it's not exactly safe you know."

Natsu crossed his arms and stared out towards the rising sun over the city, "Lucy, we need answers, his behavior was really suspicious."

I wanted to say no, I really did, but there was somwthing in me that just needed to go for it. I really hate how wacky my mind is sometimes, like some weird cuckoo clock. I nodded back to the group and Natsu smiled as he lead the way. We quietly went for it, creeping along the edges of the streets like shadows. If a person came within a small radius of us, we pretended to look as if we knew where we were going; as if.

The inner parts of the city were nothing like the outside, jagged building with dirty window-panes and broken doors strutted out onto the street almost as if they ere about to jump up and jaywalk. Really creepy, scratch that, very creepy.

Levy was literally shaking in her shoes with each step, and I wasn't far behind. A man, long hair in dreads, baggy clothing, was smoking on the street, almost like a scarecrow. Jet must have been feeling pretty brave, because he strut right up to the man and asked him in his most persuasive voice, "Excuse me sir, but a friend of mine is missing, you haven't happened to see a tall kid with shaggy black hair have you?"

I immediately pulled Levy and Natsu into an alley, Droy quick to follow. Not that I didn't trust Jet, but this could easily backfire.

To our collective surprise, he jogged back to us grinning, "That old guy said he did see Redfox, said he barreled into that old abandoned church down the street."

"As much as I appreciate the effort Jet, please don't do that again." Levy said with unease. I agreed but didn't say anything.

"Well let's get going then, I've got a bone to pick with that asshole." Natsu said, grinding his fists.

"Language dummy!" I said, slapping him on the head. He would be cursing left and right before we knew it.

"Jeez Lucy, lay off a bit."

I huffed and kept walking. The sun was lower now, reflecting a pleasant mix of red and yellow onto our faces. This whole situation was seeming worse by the minute, if Gajeel really was caught up in dangerous company, then who were we, a group of kids, to intervene? I know the boys are angry over what happened to Levy, but there must be so many reasons as to why Gajeel did what he did. He'd never done anything like that to a girl before, even though he did get into a lot of fights. Something just seemed off, like why did he just run off? Obviously the drugs were the problem, but there should have been no reason why he would be taking them out during school. If he was a dealer, then he wouldn't have been so dimwitted as to take them out in the middle of the day. From what we had learned from our drug safety seminar back in the beginning got the year, dealers at schools usually liked to do their business when there were less people around, which made a lot of sense.

So why did Gajeel take out a bag full of drugs in the middle of the day? I mean, even if he had to sell it to someone, he wouldn't have had to sell the whole stash, no one at school would be able to buy all of that, whatever it was. Then it dawned on me, Levy had had said that the drug was poweder-like, which meant that it wasn't your average marijuana. According to the seminar, there were broadly two different classifications of drugs, "hard" and "soft". Marijuana and others like it were labeled as soft, and as such were highly used. Then there were hard drugs, drugs that really were very dangerous for your health. One of those was cocaine, a fine white powder capable of giving someone intense highs, but it came with a price: severe addiction. Could that have been the drug that Gajeel had? And if it was, what was he doing with possession of such a dangerous drug? He was only in middle school!

I was lifted from my thoughts by Natsu, who had put his hand up in front of me, signaling us to halt. There was a liquor store to our right, a shoddy and beat up sign on its front. The entrance looked like it hadn't been used in years.

"See that alley beside the store?" Natsu asked, "I heard something down that way, almost sounded like Gajeel."

"Are you sure?" Levy asked him, craning her head farther in the direction Natsu was pointing, "It could have been anyone."

"Just trust me alright?" Natsu said shortly, and he crept into the liquor store for a few minutes. He came back with a smirk.

"So, the guy at the register is sleeping, and there's an old stairwell with an unlocked door. We can get a clear view of whatever is going down in that alley if go up there."

I was skeptical, this could turn out really bad, not to mention the trouble we could get into by going into a liquor store of all places.

Natsu read the distress in my face, "Ah, come one Lucy, we've got no other option. We'll be in and out pretty quickly." he said as he extended his hand to me, I took it, noting it to be squishy, and followed him into the store, the other three right behind us.

As Natsu had said, the staircase was accessible, and we crept up with discretion. The top of the roof had a few heat generators, but was otherwise barren. A clang echoed from the alley. Quickly, we rushed to the edge, and took in the scene before us.

Gajeel was crouched in a servile position, a group of menacing men stood around leisurely, while one of them, who I guessed was the leader, sneered at Gajeel's form.

"So, you actually managed to not fuck this job up, huh Gajeel?" the man asked, "Because usually, this is the part where I beat your sorry ass."

I heard a sharp intake of breath from Levy, who was staring wide-eyed.

Gavel spoke with a shaky voice, "Yeah, I did the job fair and square. So... can I have him back and go home now?"

The man considered the boy and then smirked, "No, I don't think so. You see, you might prove useful in the future, I mean, what kind of cop would suspect a kid like of carrying around drugs. And, as for your little animal friend, I think I'll keep him a little longer; for incentive." he said that last part into Gajeel's face, and I saw the black-haired boy in fear for the first time.

"No! Jose, you gotta give him back right now- I-I can't let you guys just keep him, he's the only friend I got!"

The man, who was apparently named Jose, only laughed it off, a cruel laugh, mocking Gajeel and taking sadistic pleasure in his despair at the same time, "What a riot! Hear that boys? This shithead's only friend is a damn cat! What a fucking loser!"

The other men behind Jose guffawed as well, and it was then I heard the soft 'meow' of a cat coming from a bag that one of the men was holding. Gajeel perked up at this instantly, instantly pleading again with Jose to let him have his cat but to no avail.

I looked at Natsu, and saw in his eyes that he had the same thoughts running through hid head as I had in mine; I didn't know what to do. Here was Gajeel, displaying a side that none of us had ever seen before, that maybe no one had ever seen before, and I just couldn't help but, pity him.

Levy caught my eye and jerked her head towards the situation below, "Lucy.. we should call the cops."

"Are you sure Levy?" I asked, "Maybe we shouldn't get caught up in this."

"I agree." said Natsu, "Why should we help him after what he did to Levy? Just leave him."

Levy was shaking her head, "No Natsu, what he did to me may have been bad, but... we can't let him suffer, not like this."

Natsu eyed Jet and Droy, "What do you guys think?"

Jet sighed, "I guess I agree with whatever Levy does."

"Same." nodded Droy.

I smiled, well, its not like those two would've disagreed with Levy anyway. Natsu was sulking but I know Levy had convinced him. I took my phone out, and dialed 911.

* * *

Gajeel did end up getting his ca back, who's name turned out to be Pantehrlily, strange, but Gajeel was strange too, so I guess it made sense. The cops were there within minutes of my call, and they were there to Jose and his gang members. Gajeel was initially in trouble as well, but after some convincing from us, they let him off with a warning, considering he was blackmailed into doing what he did. Gajeel was cowling the entire team, and took off with our thanking us.

I expected as much, but what I didn't expect was the look he gave Levy right before leaving, as well as the gruff 'sorry' he muttered to her. Was he actually embarrassed? That was a first, since the he had never shown any outward sign of emotion ever before.

The police actually congratulated us on our work, but they did tell us that what we did should not be attempted again, and yes, they did contact our parents. Somehow Natsu managed to convince the others' parents that it was him dragging them us all along. That didn't help Igneel's galore when he came to pick up Natsu.

Mama suspected as much and asked me alter at home what had happened and I told her the truth. She invited Igneel and Natsu over for a talk, which ended up both of them delivering joint speech to the two of us on why we should never do something that, and I quote, insanely and utterly stupid, ever again.

That night found me and Natsu laying down on my bed, exhausted from the day's events. The last thing I saw before I went to sleep was his hair, reflecting moonlight like the waves of a pink ocean.

* * *

 **So, you'll probably be wondering why I was gone. Shit happened, school, injuries, more school. I was gonna update two weeks after the last chapter, but then I was hounded by school. I also did a pretty stupid thing over spring break and got alcohol poisoning, which put me off for another week. Then my soccer team in school made it to the state championships, and we lost on penalties, so that made me depressed for like another week, and then AP testing overlapped that, so its just really been very busy for me. Hopefully I can start update frequently again, since summer's almost here.**


	23. A New Ending

**So, with the timeskip coming very soon indeed, I have a little problem. I know you guys crave the nalu moments, and i want to deliver, but this story being in the pov of lucy, a girl, I don't know how well i'll be able to write them. I don't have much experience with girls in real life, mostly because I'm shy around them (I'm 17, such a loser right?), so I don't know how well i'll be able to write for an older Lucy, I really hope i'll be able to pull it off though. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know, thank you!**

* * *

"Say cheese!" my mom instructed us, smiling, "I can't believe you two are graduating middle school already!"

I can't believe it either, especially the fact that we actually would have a graduation for middle school! Oh well, at least I got to dress up in a nice blouse. Mama had just finished taking a picture of Natsu and me. He was dressed in a blue button-up that stretched over his large stomach and dress pants that looked like they would burst any second. I told him to wear something looser, since it would hurt otherwise. Of course the headstrong idiot didn't listen. I was actually taller than him now, by a few inches. He hadn't hit his growth spurt yet, so he was still the same old Natsu overflowing with flab, not that it mattered to me of course.

"Lu!" Levy called out to me while running over, a breathless sort of smile gracing her features, "I can't believe we're about to go to high school, can you?"

I smiled at Levy slyly, "Nope, I'm still getting over it. In fact, I still can't even get over the fact that Gajeel of all people is here!"

Levy turned all shades of red, "Wh-what are you talking about?" she asked, when she knew exactly what I was talking about. I never failed to notice the faint red on her face whenever he was around. I reckon he had apologized to her privately after that fatal day we found him in the alley, and did she ever have it bad since then! Its not like Gajeel was the same scary guy after that either, he stopped getting into fights, and I often saw him watching Levy.

I giggled, "Levy, he's a freshman in high school, which means he should not be over there." I said pointing to where a scowling Gajeel was getting punch, "That can only mean that _someone_ here asked him to come. Now, I know he never had any friends in any grade other than his own. The closest thing he had to that… was you."

I smirked at Levy's reaction as she sputtered to answer, "Y-you, you know wh-what, fine, I did invite him and don't give me that look! I saw him at a store the other day and he looked really bored, s-so I offered for him to come here, y-you know, free food and all, hehe."

I just gave Levy my best 'told you so' look and dropped it. She would eventually sort out the jumbled mess called her feelings, and when she did, I would be there to gloat. I felt a tug on my skirt, it was Natsu, about to say something, when we both heard an obnoxious voice call out, "Hey Fatneel." Dear god, it was douchebag Sting.

With so many people milling around for the post-graduation lunch, nobody seemed to notice the maliciousness in Sting's voice. He stalked forward with a strange smile on his face, "Never thought you'd graduate, but here you are retard."

Natsu didn't say anything, only glowered at him. Sting took this as a sign to continue, "Well, you better get ready for high school, because I've got a lot of friends from other schools coming, and, let me tell you something." Sting was now very close to Natsu's face, which was trying very hard not to look Sting in the eyes, "We do not tolerate fatasses who like to mouth off, so you better watch out for a living _hell_."

"Back off Sting." I growled out, making to grab Natsu away.

"Oh, Heartfilia, if you wanted a date, you should've just asked." Sting said smugly, grabbing my arm as I tried to pull away. Since when did he want to get with me? I hated his guts for all the things he had done to Natsu. Thankfully, that's what set Natsu off. He violently tore Sting's hand away from my arm, and glared at the boy.

"Try that again Sting, and see what happens asshole." Natsu said. Sting was about to move forward and say something, when the principal saw us.

"Boys, not doing anything _inappropriate_ now, are we?" he said wearily, striding forward with the confidence that can only be gained through years at his post. Sting only gave an apologetic shrug and, with one last glare at Natsu and me, strolled off to his friends.

"What an ass." I said, in an effort to cheer Natsu up, who still only looked like he had been punched in the gut. The bullying he endured hadn't exactly lessened in the past couple years, but he tried not to let it bother him, most of the time. There were still some days he didn't come to school for no other reason than because he was tired, tired of it all. As Natsu became more of a social pariah at school, especially this last year where he wasn't in any of my classes, I found myself making other friends. Don't get me wrong, Natsu was still my best friend and everything, just now, I had other friends besides Levy, ones that Natsu barely knew and who he wasn't that comfortable with.

One of them was coming over now to talk to me, " Oh god." Natsu said, "Here comes Erza, that girl scares the shit out of me."

"Hush." I giggled, as I smiled at Erza. Natsu said something about the bathroom and left. I don't know why he was so scared of Erza, the redhead was very pretty and nice, unless of course she got angry, whereas then all bets were off.

"Hey Lucy, you look pretty."

"Thanks, Erza, you too!" I said.

"I can't believe the year's over, can you? At least most of us are going to be at the same school next year."

I nodded my head, "Yeah, that's a plus for sure. Say, I'm curious, what happened with that Hauser kid the other day?"

Erza gave me a conspiratorial look, "I don't know _what_ you're talking about Lucy."

"Oh come one Erza, you know exactly who I'm talking about!" I said. The other day, I had seen a very embarrassed Erza after school, with a blond boy who had a rose in his hand, I didn't get to really see out the scene, but I had an inkling of what it may have been. Ezra really was _very_ pretty, what with that billowing scarlet hair and perfect feminine features, not to mention that I have also heard many a comment about specific parts of her body, and I will never repeat them for fear of dying from blushing too hard.

After glaring at my amused grin for a minute, Erza relented, "Fine, he asked me out, and I said no, happy?"

"No, I'm not, why'd you say no Erza? He's pretty cute isn't he?"

"He just wasn't my type Lucy." Erza sighed.

"Whatever you say." I said, though I still doubted her reasons. Erza was a really nice girl, she was actually the first friend I had made outside of Levy, Jet, Droy, and Natsu. I still remember it like it was yesterday. I had walked into homeroom one day and sat down. The girl next to me had gasped, "I-is that, is that cake?"

I had been very confused, until I had seen her hand pointing to a little pin on my top that Natsu had given me; it had cake on it. Long story short, she was impressed with my knowledge of _fashion_ , which to her was apparently centered around colors that reminded her of cake, and also just plain cake; hey, everyone has a little bit of crazy in them somewhere. That pretty much kicked off a carousel of praise everyday thereafter, with Erza always seeming to talk to me more and more about other things besides cake with each passing say. Before I knew it, she had asked if I wanted to hang out some day after school, and I had readily said yes.

With that, came an influx of newer friends, friends I met mainly through Erza. A dark haired boy named Gray, who was actually pretty attractive, though he was quiet a lot of the time, was the first one Erza had introduced to me. Then came Juvia, a pretty girl, with long, blue hair, who apparently had had the hots for Gray for a long time. After that, I met Loke, a flirtatious, but good-looking boy with light hair. Next came, Cana, whom I suspected was already proficient at getting drunk at the ripe old age of 14, but I never brought it up with her.

There were more people I had met through those guys, and I was grateful for it, because they were all good people. I tried to get Natsu to hang out with them a little, but he never seemed up for it. My other friends, in turn, always suspected that Natsu didn't like them, and they were always a little sour on it. Ezra once told me she would like to get to know Natsu and that I should invite him to hang out with them. I tried exactly that but it had ended with him hitting me with a pillow which turned into an all-out war. I still remembered lying on top of him, huffing from exertion, and asking, "So, will you come hang out _now_?"

To which he had so gleefully replied, "No."

Thankfully, I didn't have the same problem with Levy, Jet, and Droy, who had immediately meshed with them.

I was pulled from my thoughts as Lisanna came closer to Erza and I, her older sister Mirajane with her. I _loved_ Mira, she was so pretty and so sweet, almost like an older version of Lisanna, just with longer hair.

"I guess we'll see each other next year, huh?" Lisanna was saying to Erza and me.

Erza nodded her head, "You can count on it, though we might try to hang out a little in the summer with everyone, if you're up for it Lisanna?"

"Oh, of course, just shoot me a text, will you?" she asked, and walked away with Mira to talk to her parents. Just then, mama came up to me with a face of ambivalence.

"Lucy, dear, have you seen Natsu?" she asked worriedly.

"He's in the bathroom, why?" I asked.

My mom gave me an apologetic look, "Never mind, um, I have to get home sweetie, alright? Something has come up in your uh… your father's work! You and Natsu get home quickly and stay there alright?"

With that cryptic message, she jogged out of the area. Well, that was weird, even for mama. "Is that your mom?" asked Erza, "She looks just like you, you know."

"Yeah, I know." I replied, "I get that a lot."

"Well, see you later Lucy, I'll call you sometime over the summer, alright?" Erza said, patting my shoulder gently, before walking away to her parents.

"Yeah, see ya!" I yelled, and immediately went to find my pink-haired idiot. I went near the bathroom, just in time to see Natsu come out. His pudgy face lit up in delight when he saw food on a table, and he rushed over to start piling his plate. As I got closer, I saw some girls I had sometimes seen in the halls, standing in a sort of huddle. I could hear them muttering to each other as I got closer.

"Did you see him? I was just about to get something and he literally tore right through me for food, what a fatass!"

"Those man-boobies of his are so disgusting! Can't he take a hint?"

"He literally jiggles with every movement, how does anyone live like that?"

I sent a glare to group of girls as I went to Natsu, some of them glared back while the others didn't see it.

"Hey Natsu, don't listen to those girls, they're just airheads." I said.

He had stopped getting food and instead had a lost look on his face, "Nah, th-they're right when you think about it. I've never been able to control how much I eat. Igneel's always telling me to cut back, but.. I just _can't._ Guess I'll be like this forever huh?"

I hated seeing him depressed. While it was true that he had gained nearly 20 pounds in the past year alone, it didn't mean he wasn't doing anything about it. He actually managed to make the school's soccer team this year. He never played, but still. He was very good with his feet actually, doing all kinds of things with the ball that you would usually only see on TV. The only problem was, he was just too slow, and his stamina was obviously horrible. If only he was fit, the things he might be able to do. Igneel told me once that an older, retired coach had told him that Natsu had unbelievable potential for the sport, it was just too bad his body was the way it was.

Natsu still looked depressed, so I suggested going to my house and watching TV, anything he wanted since we usually argued over what to watch.

We started walking out. After making it through the courtyard where graduation was held, we entered the parking lot. Throngs of people had gathered there, still milling about. We walked along the edge of the crowd when Natsu suddenly yelled out to some random guy, "If you're gonna stare at her ass, at least do it so nobody can tell dumbass!"

Natsu snickered when the guy blushed and turned the other way.

"Was he really staring?" I asked, a little amused, it probably wasn't the first time it had happened either.

"Sort of." Natsu said, "It was more he kept like, glancing at it, back and forth and back and forth, so it was actually pretty obvious what he was up to."

"Well I guess he couldn't help it, all guys do that kind of thing." I said, and it was true. I'd seen countless guys at school do it everyday. Not to say I didn't see girls do the same thing, because well, we did, we were just more discreet about it.

"I don't do that." Natsu said, bringing me out of my blush.

"What?"

"I said, I don't stare at girls' asses all day." Natsu explained, "You said all guys do it, but I don't so.."

We had now gotten to the entrance of my house, and so I opened the door while replying, "Oh come on Natsu, I'm sure you have." I teased.

"No, not really." He said nonchalantly, "I'd look at yours, but you're too heavy." he snickered.

"Shut up idiot, that's not what I meant!" I said, blushing, and then in a more controlled voice, "I meant, that it's natural to do it, that's all."

"Oh, well, I still don't Lucy, sorry to burst your bubble." He cackled, taking the remote off the couch. At least he seemed in better spirits, at the expense of calling me fat.

"Whatever." I muttered, as I took my place next to him. We watched an obscure game of soccer for a while, because of course, I had told Natsu that he could pick what we watched. I didn't understand much, but Natsu was very much into it. The only time he's serious is when he's watching a soccer game; go figure.

I was finally able to pull him away from the game, and into picking something a bit more simple. We settled on a movie and watched, and watched, and watched, and watched some more. Our list of movies stacked up, and in the back of my mind, it nagged me that mama wasn't home yet. Dad was off somewhere, probably with her, but I didn't know for what.

I checked the time, 10:15, usually mama was back by now, or Igneel would pick up Natsu. Something was off. Natsu had fallen asleep next to me, snoring lightly.

If mama wasn't coming back, there had to be a reason between the correlation of her missing, and Igneel not coming for Natsu. Then I remembered, when she had left, she told me to take Natsu home with me; I had just forgotten about that. That meant that whatever she was off doing, it had to be something to do with Igneel. That was strange, because she had told me something different; she was never one to lie, not to me, not to anyone.

My mind went back to that day when Natsu and I had spied on the two of them. In later years we had played it off as a figment of our overactive imaginations, that Igneel and mama were not secretly parading around in the shadows. Could this have something to do with that scene all those years ago? And, if it did, what the hell was going on now?"

I might be overthinking things here; the escapades Natsu and I had gone on when we were little had instilled a strong sense for detective work inside of me. I had suddenly found myself pouring over mystery novels, crime thrillers, and even court dramas. Now here I was with a potential real-life mystery. These kinds of chances don't come often, and this was my chance to prove it. To prove what, I didn't know, but I had to do this.

Carefully, without waking Natsu, I crept out from the room, and into the kitchen. I left through the back door there, blending into the faint nightlight of the street lamps. I knew I was pretty conspicuous because of my blond hair, so I trotted out of the light, and into the dark.

I walked to Natsu's house in 15 minutes, as he only lived about a mile away. It was the same as I remembered it, a wooden shack-like house, with black tiles for a roof, and a one-car garage on the side. The front door had three steps leading up to it, with an array of old recreational equipment littered about the bottom of the steps. Their house wasn't the most elegant place, but it was certainly much warmer than my own stiff household.

I swept up the steps, allowing no noise to break the silence of the still night. The door was cracked in several places, so I made sure to push it open slowly, ever so slowly, until a slight creak was heard. Panicking, I noticed that there was a crack in the doorway big enough for me to get in, so I slipped inside, and stood still; no one was at home. At least, not at first sight. None of the lights were on, so I flipped the switch. There was dirty Laundry, probably Natsu's, lying all over the floor and sofa, filling the room with an unpleasant scent. The kitchen was equally messy, pots and pans piled up on each other as though nobody had touched the dishes for days. There was a cup of coffee on the counter near the sink, almost full.

Something fishy was going on here, the house looked like nobody had lived in it for at least a few days. There was a door that stood ajar, I could see it that it was the one that led to Igneel's room. I silently made my way across the house, afraid of something popping out at me; I've watched one horror movie too many.

There was a faint light emitting from Igneel's room. It was coming from what looked like his work table. It was a mess of loose papers and binders, pencils scattered across it in random places. I ran my hand along the smooth wood when I noticed his laptop was, surprisingly, running.

Why was it even on? Igneel was very secretive about his work, even Natsu didn't have clear idea of what it was, just that it was something obscure to do with the government. I tapped the trackpad, glad to see that it didn't yet ask for a password.

There was a program open, some sort of messaging software. There was what looked like a log of messages on the side, dating back a few months at least. I clicked on the oldest one, disheartened to find that access was denied after a period of 24 hours. I scrolled intermittently through them, getting more and more discouraged until finally, the last one was unblocked.

Apprehension streamed through me as I clicked the little mail icon, and the message flashed before my eyes.

'H, they know, they're coming, sincerely I'

Well that took the cake for most cryptic message of the century. What the hell did that even mean?! They know? They're coming? Like, it made no sense at all. Obviously since Igneel had sent this with such little substance, whoever received it must have been working closely together with him. Who was 'they' though? It sounded like Igneel was caught up in something sinister, and whoever 'they' was had found out something about Igneel that he did not want to come to light, and they were presumably after him now.

Mama had left the ceremony early, probably for work I had thought, but after thinking about this message it loosely fit. Igneel was in some sort of trouble or another, and mama had gone to help him. Maybe it was true, what Natsu and I had seen all those years ago. Mama still never let me into that room, the only secret she's ever kept from me.

I slumped back into the chair at the desk. This was all so confusing, maybe I should just go back home; if Natsu woke up alone he would assume the worst, that moron. I edged out of the house, careful to make it look like it had before I broke in. 'Broke in' as in seeing an open door and walking thorough it, I can't get arrested for that right?

When I entered my house through the kitchen door, I heard someone talking. To my shock I recognized it easily, it was mama, back from wherever she had gone. I half expected to see Igneel as I went over to room where I had left Natsu. I could see his back was turned to me, the pink spikes waving slightly, and mama was looking at him with a strange face, as though she was holding back tears.

She saw me and stopped talking, not even questioning where I had been, and started to slowly lower her head until I could only see her bangs. Natsu, noticing this halt, turned to look at me with the most sombre expression I have ever seen, twin tears streaming from both his eyes, a haunting shadow spread across that usually joyful face of his.

"Natsu, wha-"

"Igneel... he's dead" a raspy voice whispered.

* * *

 **And thus concludes the tales of fatsu. now we'll get to a timeskip, which a lot of you have been asking for. Know that, and this is important, there will be a noticeable shift in the way Lucy talks, after all, after going trhough high school, a person is bound to change. There will be more vulgar language and sexual references from this point on, beacuase let's be real, that's what a majority of my conversations are like at school.**

 **anyone who feels it should be changed to M, let me know**

 **replies:**

 **Kat the Neeko- yeah I hate school, but now Im SAT cramming, so it sucks. Are you making a manga or something?**

 **whatislifegurl- k idk**

 **Red-Velvet_erza- yeah i had this problem before too, since im not used to writing in first person. I cnat dumb it down for some reason :(**

 **Butterfree- oh thank you, and hopefully im back to regular updates now**

 **Laxusdreyar2324- thanks, they were in 6th grade last chapter**

 **Mizuroo- yeah me too**

 **CelestialWar101- Thanks! I have caught up in manga, and if you mean his face scar, I dont mind it.**

 **Debolina- yes the nalu moments, they're coming, and don't worry the timeskip is upon us**

 **LucyFullbuster14- by reveal, i assume you mean timeskip, don't worry its next**

 **xxstarsnowxx- thank you!**

 **Sareena- oh thanks!**


	24. Departure

**This is it, the last chapter before the timeskip! Thank you to anyone who's stuck around this long! Sorry if this is a little short, but this is just a transition chapter!**

 **Also, there were a lot of reviews this chapter, so I had to spend a lot of time replying to all of them, do you guys like the replies, or just don't care? If you don't care, I'll stop them, but if you enjoy them then I'll just continue doing them.**

* * *

The funeral was short and sombre.

It took place at a church near Natsu's house. Mama and I attended, and father even came, though grudgingly. As if the sky itself was mocking us, it was indeed raining outside while the minister read his standard sermon. There were maybe ten people total, Natsu the only recognizable face. Besides the two of us, there was another kid, a short, blue-haired girl with brown eyes. She clutching onto the hand of a woman with blue-white hair; the woman was weeping.

Natsu was dressed in a black suit like the rest of the men, head down, bangs covering his eyes. I had tried to get a few words out of him before the service started, but he was uncharacteristically quiet.

When the sermon was finished, they gently lowered Igneel's casket into the ground, and proceeded to cover it up with dirt, forever letting his soul into the afterlife. Natsu walk slowly over to where the new grave was stationed, and just stared at it for what seemed like hours. I faintly heard mama tell me they would be waiting for me in the car. As I walked towards Natsu, the women from before, with the blue-white hair, approached him. She put a hand on his shoulder, and I saw him study the two people in front of him. She bent down near Natsu, and said something to him that I couldn't hear.

After what seemed like at least twenty minutes, she leaned back up, gave him a small smile, and strolled away.

Natsu was left standing there, with a strange look on his face. Seeing an opportunity, I went to his side, "Come on, you don't want to stay here much longer I hope?"

He gave me a dull face, "I guess not." he sighed, and allowed me to pull him by the arm over to where our car was.

"You should come over for a bit." I was telling him, trying to lighten his mood somehow, "We can watch TV, play a game, whatever you want."

He wordlessly let me pull him into the car and then spent the whole ride home staring out the window. I knew the circumstances, but still, how quiet he was really shocked me; I don't think he had ever been this quiet in all the time I'd known him. I was sad about Igneel's death too, but, unlike Natsu, I was plagued by a small sense of guilt. What superseded all of those in my mind, what why?

Why did he die? Nothing added up, it was still the same mystery that I hadn't been able to solve that night I went out on my own. This stupid paradox was like a virus, a virus that kept knocking at the back of my head, in my sleep, in the wake, in every aspect of my life right now. Igneel worked for the government, yes, but it wasn't like he was a soldier or anything! Since when did working for the government equate to getting murdered?

"Can we just lie down on your bed?" Natsu asked me when we had gotten inside my house.

"Sure." I said, taking one look at his sullen face.

I led the way up the staircase and tip-toed to my room, swinging it open so as not to make a sound. Once Natsu walked inside, I closed it softly and joined him on my bed. He always told me he loved my bed, no idea why though.

"So, who was that lady you were talking to at the funeral, a relative?" I said, curiosity taking over.

Natsu gave a great sigh and seemed to ponder my question for a bit," I think... I think she was Igneel's sister, or at least... that's who she said she was."

"Then, that little girl was your cousin?"

"Yeah, and actually, I've been trying to figure out how to say this since we got here... I'm gonna be, gone for a while." he whispered that last part.

I didn't think I heard him right, so I just gave him a dubious stare, "What do you mean gone? Where else would you go dummy?"

He just gave me a sad smile, "Come on Lucy, obviously I can't stay here anymore. I can't exactly live by myself can I?"

This was crazy, what the hell was he talking about all of a sudden, "Natsu, I'm sure you'll find someone to take you in and if you don't you can always live with us!"

He didn't say anything, just lay there for a while. This was happening too fast, in one swoop my best friend might be gone forever.

"That lady, she said her name was Grandeeney, said I could live with her. It would at least let me not go to the orphanage something like that."

I didn't know what to say, so I said nothing. He was talking like his mind was already made up. I stared up at the ceiling, how could he just leave? Did our friendship mean nothing to him, after all these years?

With a shuddering breath I spoke, " Whe-when do you leave?"

Natsu seemed surprised by my withdrawn state, but gave me a small grin nonetheless. I'd never seen him act so mature before, "My aunt said tomorrow, she sounded urgent too."

I nodded but did speak, tears streaming down my eyes.

* * *

Morning came quick enough, but I was in a daze throughout it, slaloming through my last breakfast with Natsu. Natsu didn't talk much either, just a polite greeting to mama. He then went home to pack up his things.

Mama and I made our way to his house a few hours later. The first thing I saw was a black car, with a man in a suit driving. Natsu was standing outside of it, trying to fit the last of his luggage in the trunk. Mama had rushed forward and hugged Natsu, telling how much she'd miss him and again how sorry she was about Igneel.

Natsu noticed that I had stayed back, and gave me an inquisitive glare. He came in front of me, moments away from leaving.

"You didn't think I'd go without getting a 'goodbye' from you did you?" he said cheekily. How could he smile right now? I was being torn to shreds on the inside!

"H-hey, why're you crying weird?" he asked, alarmed, raising his hand to wipe away the tears that I had tried to stop.

"What if you never come back?" I said in a hushed voice, "What if this is the last time we see each other?"

He took my hand and gently put it to his mouth, there, he whistled a soothing tune into it; I had always loved his whistling. When he was done he put my hand on my heart.

"Lucy, even if this is the last time I'm gonna see you, trust me, I'm not gonna forget the last ten or so years that easily. I'll always remember you, that's a promise."

Then the waterworks came as I threw myself into his arms for one last hug, and, before I knew it, he was gone.

* * *

 **Well, there we go, expect that change in tone I was talking about before from next chapter and on. There will be a few chapters in the future when natsu has not come back yet, just so I can set the scene in the future.**

 **FT chapter 489:**

 **Well, all I want to see is how this affects the story as a whole, whether this recontrction will change everything or just some things.**

 **Replies: (over 30 this time, keep 'em coming!)**

 **fairy-jane-ever-123- Oh thanks, I will read some lucy POV's to prepare myself better**

 **OleanderBleedingHeart- Oh that's just the first death of many, jk, or maybe not :)**

 **FranFranWriter- thanks I'll consider that!**

 **Ishita.d- Oh, my mouth is shut**

 **fangirl4612- I aim to please**

 **bestwritereverlolz- thanks! I actually used to sort of ship Natza too, he he, at the _very_ beginning of the series **

**Gh0st's buddy- yay**

 **Hardknockliv- Oh I know all about how vulgar certain girls can be :)**

 **\- thanks!**

 **Starry Roses- np**

 **LucyFullbuster14- !**

 **Kat the Neeko- Yep, i'll read some oneshots, and does this mean you're an artist and a writer?**

 **Rose Tiger- Oh yes!**

 **Parkermags- I think you mean poor fatsu :)**

 **abbeyotaku- thank you! I'm obviously not going to be overly M rated or anything like that, unless you guys want me to?**

 **nationalcarmen- yes**

 **laxusdreyar2324- You'll find out eventually, maybe**

 **Dark Mystique- yep, hopefully :)**

 **Meimei- I'm trying fit it to be at least once a week if not more**

 **Celestial War101- oh thanks! I'll try that**

 **Angryhenry- wait and see :)**

 **King-Madrid69- Wait and see :)**

 **Sweetbutcokcy- haha I will try**

 **Butterfree- Thanks, that means a lot. and I do talk about manga with some friends, but I mainly talk with my other friends so maybe that's why, I'm what you might call a part-weeb, but I hide it well :)**

 **xxstarsnoxx- the vulgarity exposure is all about who you're around in school :)**

 **Mizuro- here it is**

 **darknights800- thanks, here u go**

 **AppleCiderr- You'll see**

 **AngelEmCuti- thanks!**


	25. Omake Special 1

**I know everyone is waiting for the timeskip, but while I write that, here's a quick little o** **make :) I promise that the first chapter of the timeskip will be a long one**

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Magnolia Middle School 8th Grader Anonymous Student Interview Part 1:

Q: What do you think about the student Natsu Dragneel?

A: Oh, that fatass. Well, when I first saw him I felt a little bad for him, but he's got such a temper! And what's up with that pink hair?! He deserves the name Fatsu if you ask me

Q: You as a girl, can you tell me whether you think him attractive?

A: Ew, no, why would you even ask that? He jiggles every time he walks! Those man boobs are disgusting! He is literally a walking blob of flesh and fat!

Q: So I take it you don't like him?

A: No one does, except that Lucy girl.

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Magnolia Middle School 8th Grader Anonymous Student Interview Part 2:

Q: What do you think about the student Lucy Heartfilia?

A: Oh, her, yeah I heard she's pretty nice, and she's really hot too.

Q: Is that a sentiment shared by many people?

A: Hell yeah, everyone thinks she's super hot!

Q: What exactly makes her in your words "super hot"?

A: I don't know just the way she looks, I don't really wanna describe that here.

Q: So I take it a lot of people like her?

A: Yeah, but she's always hanging around that Fatneel.

* * *

 **I know this is a little silly, but I thought it would be good see others' pov of our two mains, as you know this story so far been in 1st person.**


	26. New Sensations, Old Memories

**I hope I did well with this chapter. Also, would you guys want me to sometimes do a Natsu POV?** **Please leave a review if you do. Also the writing style from here on out might be a little different compared to the rest of the story, more similar to my other story- Ancient Outlook. Also Juvia won't be speaking in 3rd person in this fic, just a heads up. Also finally to anyone wondering, while this takes place in the fictional town of** **Magnolia, magnolia is located somewhere (preferably the US) in the western part of the modern day world, so things and places from the real world might have a mention or two in this.**

* * *

"Lucy!" a feminine voice urged quietly, with an air of desperation that would have usually piqued my interest. However, I was too comfortable, lying on a silky substance that felt oh so good wrapped around me. The past few hours were a muddled mess at best, and my mind was mush at the moment. Oh, what multiple shots will do to you.

"Lucy!" that same damned voice whispered, "Lucy get up, we've gotta go now!"

But I didn't want to go, it was so placating to just lie here on god knows what, the fan lightly sifting through my hair and causing little tremors to course deliciously throughout my body. Then I felt a little nudge on my body, which I paid no attention to. Another nudge, accompanied confluently with little buzzes of the same voice. Who's voice, I did not know, too tired. But whoever it was kept it up; kept nudging me, rolling me, even pulling my hair a little bit, all the while breathing down my ear different reasons on why I should get up. Was this my fucking conscious or something?!

Screw it, I couldn't take it anymore, fuck my sleep. I opened my eyes in irritation, surveying my surroundings for whomever had dared wake me from my beauty sleep. I saw ephemeral blue, and there was the face of my friend Juvia Lockser, frantically waving her hands in front of me, trying to get me to look at her. Her face was drawn into a frenetic frown.

"What?" I said peevishly, rubbing my eyes heavily while sitting up, the soft blanket pooling at my feet. It was then I noticed I was sleeping on the ground, what the hell?

"Lucy, we have to go now, right now!" Juvia said, "I know the plan was to sleep here tonight, but we have to go now!"

Something in her voice made me alert, "What the hell are talking about? Oh god," I put a slow hand to me temple, "just how much did I drink? I feel like absolute shit right now."

"We'll maybe get something for you on the way, remember I stayed sober, so I'll drive." Juvia said quickly, ushering me from up the floor and out of whoever's room I was in.

Slowly, the events of the previous hours came back to my head, spinning crazily as it was. Juvia had come up to me at school, asking if I had wanted to go to a party that night, everyone else already busy with other things. I had asked to check if anyone else at all could go with her, as I had wanted to catch up on some homework, even though it was a Friday. Unfortunately, Levy had homework, or hooking up with Gajeel, same thing really, Erza had a competition the next day, and there was a host of other excuses for all the other girls. When she turned up short in that department, she used her secret weapon on me, puppy eyes.

Now, you may be thinking, that's pretty weak of you Lucy, and also you're so pathetic. And yeah, you're right. Puppy eyes are my mortal weakness, but especially ones from Juvia. She could make anyone bend to her will with those pearls, what with her naturally curvy latina frame paired with lean muscles gained from years of swimming, combined with those dark, beautiful eyes made her look like a five year old with the body of supermodel. It was times like those when I wondered if I was Bi or not. Then again, the only one she gave that face to was me and a few others. She was a really shy person with people she didn't know that well, but once you became her close friend, like I had, it was a whole different ball game.

Shaking my head at the memory, I turned back to Juvia, who was now reduced to supporting my arm over her shoulder, stumbling slightly while she navigated us to where my car was parked. She carefully tucked me into the shotgun seat; aaah she was such a good friend. Through lidded eyes I perceived a mass moving away from me, then around the car, illuminated slightly by the one streetlight near us, and into the driver's seat.

Juvia slowly pushed the start button on the car, and to her obvious dismay, it made the same revving noise it always did, which is loud as balls.

"Shit! I hope no one heard us." she muttered. I laughed lightly in my half-inebriated state. This car had a powerful engine, it would always amp up when starting.

The car slowly was backed out, and Juvia guided us away from the mass of cars.

"So, what the hell was that about? I was pretty comfortable you know." I pouted teasingly, still swaying slightly.

Juvia glanced at me, both hands on the wheel, "Yeah I know, and I'm sorry, but you'll thank me later when you see all the Snapchat stories."

"What Snapchat stories?" I asked, noting the light grin she had on her face.

"Oh, just the ones that show the cops arresting a few dozen people for underage drinki-"

"What the shit!" I almost yelled, perking up immediately. I sat bolt upright, staring at Juvia with wide eyes so long she eventually burst into melodic laughter.

"It's not really that surprising." she said between giggles, "You know Aria Lancashire?"

I nodded, she was a junior, sort of tall, pretty brunette. I didn't know much else about her, but I had heard some rumors that she was rather... _bitchy_ at times.

"Well, she was at that party with her boyfriend, Reef, he's also a junior. Anyway," and now it was getting even harder to speak for Juvia because of how much she was giggling, "she got piss drunk and passed out, and I guess her boyfriend got pretty smashed too. So he goes and hooks up with this other girl, and they, stupidly if you ask me, stayed in bed after they were done. Aria wakes up, sees them, and starts shouting fucking bloody murder, which is what woke me up. I saw her run through a hall crying actually." Juvia took a breath and turned the steering wheel before continuing, "I felt bad for her, I mean I know what she's usually like but she is younger than us and all. So I went after her, she was locked in one of the bathrooms. And guess what? I heard her calling the cops, saying there was some emergency at the party!"

Wow, talk about revenge. I didn't think she'd ever go that far. But, I did share Juvia's giggles. It was a rather comical story now that we weren't in any potential danger. I still did feel a little bad for Aria though, I mean, obviously her douchebag boyfriend cheated on her without a second thought. I had gone out with a few guys during high school, but the last one I had was maybe at the end of junior year. His name was Ward, and thankfully the asshole was in college now. He had asked me out a bit before prom, and I had felt a little pressured since it seemed like everyone else already had a date. I stupidly said yes to him, which was the worst fucking mistake ever. I really hate my luck with guys sometimes.

Let's just say he got a little too _frisky_ at the after-party, as if I was ever going to sleep with him! The most I had ever done with a guy was kissing, and that was with my previous boyfriends. No, there was no one I had met yet who I could really be myself with, who adored me unconditionally, whom I could love wholly and them me. I know it seems like I have impossible standards, but I'll figure it out eventually. True love or bust bitches! Or something like that. Fuck it I'm drunk.

It also doesn't mean I can't get stupid wasted, which is probably what had happened last night. All I can remember is getting into a shot contest with this guy, I think his name was Bacchus. Now, you may again be thinking I'm stupid, but in my defense I usually went up against Cana, and no one can down shots like that girl. So, I thought had it in the bag. Maybe seven shots later, I was dead out, and that fucker was still grinning like a coyote. Thank god Juvia was there to take care of me after blacked out. She doesn't drink much, but when she does, it's a waterworks of tears.

Juvia pulled into her driveway, the house beyond a quaint little thing; it almost reminded me of a hut sometimes. There was a small garage that only fit one car to the left, an outward rotunda that gave way to the front door and to top it off they even had a working chimney that jutted out from the roof, complete with steady puffs of smoke coming out of it.

"Mmmm, what time is it Juvia?" I moaned through closed eyes, stretching and cricking my bones like a cat in my seat, "And why are we at your house?"

Juvia killed the engine and leaned back, huffing she opened her phone, "It's exactly 2:38 AM, and we're at my house," her face turned coy, "because I told your mom that you were sleeping over here tonight. We couldn't very well go back to your house without looking suspicious now could we?"

"I suppose you're right, do you still have my stuff from last time?" last time I crashed at her house.

She walked around the car to my side and opened the door to let me out. Then she supported me as we made our way inside, "Yeah," she grunted through exertion, "I've got your tank and some shorts, even those hot pink panties." she finished slyly with a wink that made me red. Oh no she didn't.

"Yeah yeah, make fun of me now," I grumbled as Juvia started to climb us both up the rickety stairs, "maybe if you were that open with Gray and told him how much you wanted to hook up with him, you'd be having your way with him right now instead of me."

I got the desired effect when Juvia reddened deeply, embarrassment practically wafting off of her like an aroma. She sputtered for words like she was almost choking on air and when she couldn't find any she took a deep breath to try and calm down what I could only guess to be her fluttering heart. She was putty in my hands really; one mention of Gray and I could string her along like a puppet master.

Ah Gray, Juvia's perpetual love, she told me as much when she first met me. Talked about how amazing _lovely_ her beloved _Gray-sama_ was, back when she was still in her anime phase. She still called him that sometimes, out of past habit maybe. I used to think it was just an aggressive crush, that it wouldn't last, but last it did, and I actually really admired her for it. She truly was in love with Gray. At first she was very shy around him, even used to hide behind things when he was near. But that had changed, and now Gray and her talked like friends should. Honestly my heart ached for her most of the time, she tried so hard to hint to Gray that she liked him, no, that she loved him, even made it a point to periodically ask him to dinner, a movie, coffee, anything really. Harmless stuff.

He rebuffed her every time, though I've been noticing lately that he's been looking guiltier every consecutive round. Juvia hasn't noticed of course. It's really routine nowadays, she asks Gray, expects a rejection, and goes on being wonderful to him. They both have mutual friends, and really are friends themselves. I just, never can figure Gray out. I'm certain he has a thing for her, he's just so closed off, like he's wrapped in a shadow that you have to rip apart to get through. I even asked him once out of irritation after yet another rebuffed date invite from Juvia, asked him why, if he was always going to say no, did he not end it once and for all? If he really closed off all contact with her, she might give up, but he always ended up back with her in different places, either at school or somewhere else. It was like they were two magnets who hovered just beyond connecting forever.

His answer had been very Fullbuster-like, he had simply scowled and looked off in thought and told me that he never wanted to hurt Juvia, but he wasn't sure whether he could make her happy. In short he was afraid, but he was too selfish with his feelings to fully let her go; asshole.

I sighed deeply, this was too much abstruse thinking on the wrong side of midnight.

We were in Juvia's room now, and she was shuffling around, tidying things up so we could sleep. My thoughts on her weighed heavily in my mind, mixing in with the liquor still running through my veins, making me want to cheer her up somehow. Then I smirked, tip-toeing up to her feigning heavy inebriation, and hugged her around her midriff while she was setting the bed, sagging my body on her back. I felt her still a little.

"Lucy," she said with a bit of an edge to her voice, "What are you doing?"

"Cuddling my cat." I sighed, hugging her all the more tighter; she was so soft, it may just be the alcohol talking, but if I was Gray I would have been all over her a long time ago.

"Oh no Lucy. I know you're half-sober now. You're not pulling this drunk cat fetish shit on me again." and she tried twist me around and grab my arms to hold me, but she failed ha ha.

"I will stop only on one condition," I slurred heavily on purpose for effect, "if you let me snuggle with you."

"Come on Lucy, cut it out." Julia huffed, slacking in my hold a bit, "This isn't freshmen year."

She was alluding to when we used to sleep in the same bed on a school trip when were freshmen.

I nudged Juvia down on the bed, falling on top of her and lying there, "Just this once, Juvia, pleeeeeeaaaseeee?"

I gave her my best pout, and, finally, she gave me that golden smile of hers, breaking under my assault. Success.

"Fine, we will _snuggle_ , just this once."

"Ok, I know there's someone else you'd just love to do this with anyway." I answered; she blushed cutely again.

Juvia disentangled herself from my arms, and finished making the bed. Then she turned around and stripped to her undergarments; she was really shy with anyone but her closest friends. I was still tipsy so she carefully dragged me in with her. I guess more alcohol was in my system than I thought, because as soon as she tucked me in under the covers and proceeded to do so herself, I wrapped my arms and legs around her, tucking my head between her neck and shoulder, nuzzling her hair. I could almost feel her roll her eyes.

Juvia relaxed into my hold, aware that when I was like this there was no stopping me. She yawned heavily and then said one last thing with progressively slower breaths before closing her eyes for the night.

"You know," she snorted, "I saw the strangest thing today. Was at a umm... store... and saw... a boy... with pink hair... of all things... so _strange_."

Something snapped inside, and then darkness took me.

This will be interesting, won't it?

* * *

 **Right, how did I do? This is the introduction to Lucy, beginning her senior year. I really appreciate the reviews with advice on the writing from you guys,**

 **keep reviewing!**

 **replies:**

 **King-madrid69- no i don't think so, that info is important for later on**

 **kat the Neeko- you're not gonna die and I'd be sad then if you did :(**

 **Butterfree- thank you, I tried too get it in there**

 **ashfrenzy- I have updated**

 **Rose Tiger- yes poor fatsu :)**

 **nationalcarmen- yes I guess I am**

 **AlaizaAvena- we'll see :)**

 **Tethys x13- here it is!**

 **laxusdreyar234-** **you're welcome!**

 **bestwritereverlolz- idk if that was m rated, but I tried (a little)**

 **AppleCiderr- How do you like it so far?**

 **CeletialWar101- thank you!**

 **Guest- OK!**

 **Tiernank- here you go!**

 **Flor de CerezoNFTLC- thank you, I really appreciate that insight! That is what I set out to do when i started this story**

 **Guest- it is here now calm yourself :)**

 **XTernel- did I handle it well?**

 **fairy-jane-ever123- I've updated**

 **Ishita.d- I must be a meanie for your own good :)**

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 **xxstarsnowxx- yes, you got it right!**

 **Sawakaze-Steph16- thanks!**

 **AangelEmCuti- thx!**

 **Meiyo12- I'm not as weak as Lucy, but her you go anyway :)**


	27. Suspicion

**Right, sorry it took a bit longer for this to come out, I was on vacation and couldn't really get to a device to write, but I wrote this in one sitting, so enjoy! On a side note, I am still debating whether to do a natsu pov, so nothing is decided yet. Also, I am going to to change it to M soon, and I have a reason. Up until a short while ago, I had general idea of where I wanted the story to go up until at least the rising action, but past that I had no idea what to do for the climax and so forth, until I had an epiphany, but it is very much _not_ T rated (it's not really sexual either, so don't worry if you think there'll be lemons:), unless you want them lol) , so I will be changing it to M, thank you for understanding**

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If booze was my midnight answer to the subconscious fear of becoming nothing more than an old cat-lady, then aspirin was the essential remedy to that answer. The searing headache that greeted me as I woke up was not exactly new to me, but I will admit I have never had one quite that brutal before. My temple was simply drumming with a sharp pounding that made me feel like my head was about to explode.

I sat up a bit too quickly after opening my eyes and immediately regretted it as it caused the room to spin. Holy shit, my head felt like it was filled with straw! I dropped my head back down onto the pillow, thankful that at least the windows remained close, preventing any sunlight at all. It was still dark in the room, the only light coming from a small alarm clock in the stand to me left; I peered at it: 7:26 AM.

I sighed and draped an arm over me head; it still hurt like hell. What had happened last night again? All I remember was the party and going home with Juvia. Wait, Juvia! I quickly realized that the firm presence I was feeling on my waist was not a pillow but Juvia herself! Oh god, I probably went all cuddly-mode on her again. Damn my drunken need to snuggle! I'm at least fortunate that the stupid habit hasn't gotten me into more trouble than it's worth.

Interestingly enough, it was her arm, not mine, that was round the other person's waist. Guess she enjoys it more than she lets on. I'll innocently remind her about it when she least expects it, hmm, maybe in front of Gray for maximum exposure!

Carefully disentangling myself from Juvia's arm, I shimmied out of the bed, and dropped onto the floor into a crouch, landing softly on my feet so that I wouldn't wake sleeping beauty up there. I sprang up slowly, higher than my normal height, my feet stretching to the limit while my arms did the same. When I felt a satisfying crick, I loosened up. I really needed to start yoga again, it felt amazing.

I used the old trick of snatching the door handle and giving it a quick, sharp tug so as to make minimum noise, and then I walked downstairs, a few creaks here and there. I happened upon the kitchen. It was a really quaint one, with a olden-style sink and a fridge that looked like it was the first one ever made. I sank myself onto the chair that was situated at the island in the middle.

I'm totally screwed; it's a Saturday and that means Juvia doesn't have to get up early like she usually does for swimming, which means she'll sleep in. Her adoptive parents are probably already at work, since they're both bigshots. Juvia's siblings were too young to drive. That left me stranded here, my own car back at my place. I could walk back to my house, but it would be unpleasant. Not that I'm complaining, I'm in good shape seeing as how my lacrosse coach is probably a closet sadist, but going down that route would cause me to relive some painful memories.

I sat there in that kitchen for at least twenty minutes before snapping. It had been three years, so what! I had to deal with it somehow eventually, and what better time than now, especially since my hangover would probably numb the pain.

I strolled out into the morning, the sun just creeping through the trees that surrounded the house, casting a yellowish glow on the place. The wind was light so it was actually pleasant for once, something I couldn't always so about Magnolia weather. There were a few treed I passed that had lost many leaves already, those of which were randomly bunched in clusters all around me. I walked through some, not minding the wet leaves sticking to my boots.

I had stolen one of Juvia's jackets; I'd give it back of course. I mean, it's not like I really wanted people to see what I wore to bed. Now I just looked like a morning jogger who liked to wear short shorts instead of yoga pants.

As I drew closer to the place that I was dreading, I kept my head down, forcing myself to look away, having to contort my head painfully to the opposite side so I wouldn't be tempted. Unfortunately when the place was on the periphery of my vision, temptation lured me back in, and I allowed my head to take that slight turn; it was all I needed to see that house of my old friend, Natsu Dragneel.

It looked eve more broken down than before, I guess no one wanted to live in a dead man's house. The door was hanging lightly at the hinges, probably termites. There leaves all over the yard, the house being an untouched fantasy in an otherwise meticulously maintained suburban neighborhood. Whether it was done through respect or fear, I didn't know, and I really didn't care either.

I hurried my pace, home should be closer now. Faintly, I felt tears start to prick my eyes, and I tried dabbing at them to stop the initial leak before the flood could come. Every goddamn time I see anything related to that house and the boy that used to lived there, I couldn't stop the tears. He had been the closest friend I'd ever had, and when he moved, for a time at least, I thought for certain that we would see each again. It's not like all contact between us had to stop just because he had to move, but that's exactly what happened. I couldn't find any way of contacting him, no matter how hard I had tried, it was always in vain. I even asked mama once, why, why it had to be like that? Certainly it couldn't have been because he no longer wanted to talk to me?

She had told me to stop being silly, that Natsu would never think like that, but when I further questioned her, she did something peculiar. She gave a start, like she was about to say something then composed herself and thought better of it. It was like she knew something, something important, but she wouldn't tell me.

None of it had ever made any sense, the countless times I had tried to contact Natsu over the internet, it ended in failure. That in itself was strange because Natsu was very good with computers. In fact, he had almost gotten into a spot of trouble when we were 13. He never had never fully explained it to me, but simply laughed it off and said that he was lucky to have gotten away, whatever that meant.

So really, I should have been able to find him somewhere on the internet, maybe an errant picture, or a random social media account, but there was nothing, as if Natsu Dragneel had been wiped off the face of the planet. I had tried looking up his step-mother, Grandineey, too, in hopes of maybe contacting her instead. I had only found a dilapidated Twitter account that had next to no information on it; so much for that.

I just wanted to see Natsu once, just _once_ , to see that big goofy smile I missed so much, that pink shock of hair that he claimed was salmon. Wait a second, pink?! That word reverberated through my mind a few dozen times, like a ping pong ball, as if I had just recently heard it. Perhaps last night? Maybe it was at the party? Or maybe something Juvia said to me? I'll have to ask her later about that. Now, I had to get home, and probably explain to my father where I had been.

The kitchen door was open thankfully, and I was beginning to think that maybe I wouldn't have to answer awkward questions after all when I heard a loud, and probably not accidental, cough. There stood my father, standing in the doorway, dressed to go to work, with a briefcase in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other. The mug read 'World's Greatest Dad' on it, and if not for the tension of the current situation, I might have laughed at the irony of that cup.

"You walked outside wearing _that_?" he asked, gesturing with a pointed hand to my short shorts and sweatshirt.

"No, father, I _slept_ in them... and then I walked in them."

My father shook his head as if he had lost all hope for the world, and turned away, muttering, "Why did I have to have such a bodacious daughter?"

I angrily picked up an apple from the counter and gnashed my teeth in it. My father was never one to directly insult me, it was always offhand, always subtle, like a snake without poison. Sure, I hadn't exactly grown up to be the corporate magnate that he had wanted me to be, but I still did perfectly well in school as well as excelling in lacrosse. Not that he'd know, seeing as how he's never gone to a single one of my fucking games.

I sighed and rubbed my temples. Sleep was beckoning me, but I knew that if I slept now, I wouldn't wake up until evening. Nothing like sleeping the whole day to make your already disappointed father even more hopeless about your future.

Bored, I switched on the television, and found myself a bit peeved when the first thing I saw was breaking news, of yet another bombing. What was that, the eighth major incident this year? I swear it felt like the world was going to shit sometime soon. Thankfully most of the violence was in the east, but I mostly forced myself to avoid reading about the state of affairs; I got depressed easily these days. Still, it doesn't hurt to have a general gist of the situation, and I had more or less grasped it amidst the terror of the past few years, which, interestingly enough, started becoming more pronounced near the time when Igneel was murdered, no doubt just a coincidence right?

Simply, a large number of radicals in the east were worshipping a certain deity, a death god of sorts if you will. Nobody knows why they follow it or even how they claim to 'receive' instructions from it, but the results speak for themselves. Massive damage and trauma all over the world, each successive event having more and more the feel of a coin collector, and the collection was almost done. The cause of all of this is shrouded in shadows of origin too dark for anyone to dare venture in.

Still, I tried to not let the horrors of the real world dampen my spirits too much. If I did that, then it would mean victory for the radicals, who sought not only world wide domination, stupid, but subjugation as well. Like hell it would ever happen, but the air of minimal danger always rested upon my shoulder, as the home-front of wars past must have felt.

Mama came into the kitchen, looking as if she had just finished her morning run.

"Lucy, honey, I thought you were sleeping at Juvia's?" she said.

"I did actually, just got home," I said, slipping of my seat to go make coffee for her; she liked it after her runs.

"Have you seen your father, by any chance?"

I snorted with derision, "Oh, I saw him alright. Remind me again _why_ he hasn't disowned me yet?"

"Lucy," my mother began in that voice of her's.

"No, don't 'Lucy' me mama, every time we talk these days, it's the same thing!" I said, my hands on my hips, "You could do better Lucy, study harder Lucy, you disappoint me Lucy, when will it ever stop? When I've become CEO of his company? Because I can tell you, that is the last thing on my mind."

I turned back to the coffee pot, intent on finishing. Mama sat down for a bit, contemplating something. I made the coffee, and went to give it to her in a mug. When I drew close, she tugged my hand and bade me sit next to her. I did as she told, and, my hand still in hers, mama started stroking it lightly, soothingly.

"Honey, you're father's just afraid, that's all, afraid that when he's gone, there will be no one else to do his work that he trusts, that he _knows_ will succeed. He believes that that person is you. I know that you yourself don't, and maybe you're right, maybe you really are not cut out for bureaucracy. But you know what? I think he is so hard on you so critical, because he doesn't want you to waste your life, as he feels he has."

"Waste my life, as he feels he has?" I repeated incredulously, "Since when does being a millionaire owner of an internationally successful business equate to a waste of life?"

Mama only smiled sadly, "You'll find out one day sweetheart, sometime soon regrettably, and when you do, please try not to be too angry at him. He does love you after all, you're his daughter."

Mama was obviously in one of those sentimental moods, so, excusing myself, I headed up to my room to shower and get ready for the day. Maybe I should go out, meet Levy or someone else, and just relax.

Maybe, a small part of my head thought, maybe I could also ask Juvia what she had told me last night again, the key word being pink. Out of curiosity of course, nothing else!

* * *

 **Right, the meeting is drawing closer, but I will tell you, that we will see Lucy at school before then.**

 **replies:**

 **Deathslayer Night- No of course not, Levy was busy, Juvia is just another of Lucy's close freinds**

 **AppleCiderr- I updated**

 **Nico2883- I can't very well rush it can I?**

 **Sarah- don't worry :)**

 **Zessica902- thx!**

 **Gh0st's buddy- It should be good I hope**

 **Kat the Neeko- Thx for feedback, and of course I wouldn't want you to die lol :)**

 **Brannasaurus Rex- Thank you !**

 **Celestial War101- Thank you, I'm still debating**

 **xTernel- Yes, but my life is not that crazy I swear :), and I'm not bisexual lol, thank you for feedback!**

 **ashfrenzy- You will have to wait a little longer of course**

 **King-Madrid69- Thank you!**

 **laxusdreayr2324- Oh i skipped it bc that's the 3 year timeskip mentioned in the summary**

 **Ishita.d- patience :)**

 **Flamexofxchaos- Lucy is 17 now!**

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 **Rose Tiger- Of course you never know:)**

 **Mizuroo- Thanks!**

 **AngelEmCuti- thanky ou!**

 **Tethys x13- you will just have to see :)**

 **KiyoshiWakeshima- here you go**

 **xxstarsnowxx- yeah I'm still thinking**

 **NatsumiDragneelxmeredy- I will :)**


	28. Revelation

**Thank you to xternel who pointed out a tiny inconsistency in the last chapter, which has been fixed. If you want to check it out just read the** **last line of the last chapter. Lucy still doesn't remember that Juvia said she saw a "boy" with pink hair, just the word pink. Sorry that this chapter took a while, it was not my intention at all. I've been having all these ideas for a book lately and they've really been distracting me. Plus i have summer hw that needs taking care of, not to mention vacation.**

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I pulled up to the backlot of a popular cafe, one not named Starbucks, killed the engine and locked the car. As I got out, I saw a cute younger girl exiting the place. She had dark blue hair and she looked to be in her early teens. I felt like I had seen her before, but shrugged it off; I was probably still drowsy.

The door jingled with a little bell when I pushed it open, and I caught Levy's eye from our favorite corner booth. I sidled up beside her and patted her head, which I knew she hated.

"How many times have I told you not to do that Lu?"

"As many times as you want, but I'm still gonna do it," I said with a smile.

"So, what's up with you? Cana was telling me all about what a night you and Juvia had yesterday."

I stretched my arms above my head and picked up a menu to hide my face, "Oh hush, we all know what you and Gajeel get up to, so there's no need for you to lecture Juvia and me."

At this she blushed and took out her phone to avoid looking at me in the eyes. Her and Gajeel had been going out for a few years now, I never would have guessed it, much less allowed it in an earlier time, but the change he went through after that fateful day was shocking to say the least. Sure he was still grumpy as could be, but turns out he has a soft side, at least according to Levy. And, instead of roaming the streets, as many thought he would be doing after finishing high school, he sucked it up, and enrolled in a small, local university, to be close to Levy, and to have a batter future. Pretty good for a guy who used to be mixed up in street gangs and drugs. Now he was more akin to a contestant on 'The Bachelor' if you ask me.

"Shut up Lu, just because you're jealous, doesn't mean you have tease me you know."

"Jealous?" I asked incredulously, "Why would I be jealous of Gajeel? I don't like him!"

"Of course not!" Levy said in a mocking tone, "You're jealous of what we have."

I sputtered while searching for a comeback, and when turning up empty, I strolled to the counter to order coffee. Was I jealous of a nice relationship like theirs? Certainly not, I couldn't be, could I? I repeatedly tried to convince myself that I was happy, happy to be alone. I had amazing friends, wasn't that enough?

"Hey, hey," Levy interrupted my thoughts, "I was just teasing you, no need to give me the silent treatment."

"Sorry, I was just thinking about something else," I lied.

"If you say so," Levy said with raised eyebrows.

"So, tell how last night was, was it worth skipping homework?" she continued.

"Definitely not, it was like every other party, except of course the cops busting it."

"No way! That was the one you guys were at? It was on everyone's stories!" Levy exclaimed.

I grimaced, hoping no one saw Juvia and I sneak away, "Yeah, but that's not even the most interesting thing that happened last night. Listen, right before she fell asleep, Juvia said the word 'pink' to me. What do you think that means?"

Levy gave me a sympathetic but bemused look, "Lu, it probably means you two were drunk out of your minds, and didn't know what the other was saying."

"But Juvia didn't drink, she was the designated driver!"

"But you did, and I know how you like to go overboard," Levy said with a smirk.

"It means something, Levy, it has to," I said stubbornly.

"Suit yourself, if you really want to know, just ask her what she meant if she really did say that," Levy checked her watch, "Uh oh, my shift at work's about to start, gotta go."

"When did you start working?"

"Since last week, it's just a little bistro near the school, see ya."

I waved goodbye to her and finished my drink in silence. Out of the corner of my eye, I spied a few boys who I recognized from school; they were stealing numerous glances at me any chance they could. Annoyance flared up within me, if they wanted something they should just come over and talk, not spy on my like pathetic cowards. I got up and left to get in my car.

Sadly that happened a lot. I always noticed that a lot of boys around this age hung out a lot more with girls who generally were known to put out, or at least had in the past. Of course there were always multiple exceptions to this rule, such as Gray or Loke, flirtatious as the latter was, he at least talked normally sometimes.

Why was it so wrong to hang with a girl who just wasn't interested in stuff like that? I always notice lots of boys staring at me when I'm in school, but none of them ever come and talked to me, save a tiny few. Ironic how the first and closest friend I've ever had had been a boy, but then again he never acted like anyone but himself, the epitome of a non-conformist, almost to point of annoyance sometimes, but I had adored him for it.

Shit, my mind was back on the taboo subject of Natsu. I turned on the radio so that it might drown out my brain. Cranking up some cantankerous hip-hop, I just sat back and let my mind be enveloped by the overlaying beats and rhythm, calming me.

That reminded me, I had better, call Juvia and ask what all the fuss was about last night. Levy may have thought I was crazy for it, but that sense of solving a mystery that I had when I was younger never truly left me, so I shot Juvia a quick text.

 _Did you say anything to me last night about something pink?_

Almost immediately I got a response, guess she was awake now.

 _Yeah, didn't you hear me? I said I saw a boy with pink hair the other day, I only mentioned it to you cuz you don't see that often._

My breathing quickened ever so slightly, a boy with pink hair? That sounded a lot like Natsu, but it couldn't be him could it? Lots of people could have pink hair.

I got out of the car on my driveway and made my way inside. It was time I asked my mother some questions.

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 **very sorry the chapter's kinda short, but I still have writers block for this story, I'll make sure to get out the next chapter soon, and I will do replies next chapter.**


	29. Reunion

**So, yeah, hi, guess** **who's back, back again? its not slim shady unfortunately but uhhhhh, its me hi and I really want to apologize to anyone still reading this shitshow. I got caught up in college applications and lost the drafts for the next part of this story so that wrecked my motivation, but I'm deciding that I shouldn't let it end, especially since I hate seeing abandoned stories on this site, so I will try to hopefully finish this before going to college next fall, which might be the last time I write on this site. Thank you to anyone still reading, I really appreciate it and sorry again :)**

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My mind felt numb as I pulled into the driveway; there had to be something that I was missing. How was it possible that Julia had seen a boy with pink hair? The only person I'd ever seen sporting that shade was Natsu, and it had been three long years of solitude since I saw him. Of course, I was never alone, I can thank my friends for that, but it was like the Natsu was the captain of the ship that I called my friends, and without him there, I had always felt lost.

My mother was cutting onions when I entered the kitchen, "Mom, I heard something interesting today from Juvia."

She looked up, a few unnatural tears pricking her eyes, but nonetheless pleased to see me, "Oh yes, and what was it dear?" she asked, looking back down at the onions.

I slowly walked to a chair and slowly lowered myself onto it, steeling myself, "She said she saw a boy with pink hair the other day... curious isn't it?"

Mom slowly jolted but tried to resume her previous motions, "Now, honey... why would you think that curious?"

"I mean, have you ever seen anyone with pink hair?"

"Lucy just because we haven't seen something does not mean it doesn't exist. There are a lot of different hair colors out there, Juvia probably only thought to tell you because it surprised her that someone could have pink hair.

"Mom, answer the question, please," I said, now standing up and walking towards my mother, resting at a spot across her.

She looked at my eyes once, hard, then looked away again, as if pondering the situation, "If this is about Natsu-"

"Of course it's about Natsu!" I exploded

"Dear, I know you miss Natsu, but just because someone has pink hair does not mean it's him," mom said after taking a deep breath, ducking her head so I couldn't see her eyes again.

She was cutting faster now, as if nervous, that was the one thing that she did, get agitated under pressure, I just needed to get her to spill the beans. I scooted closer to where she was standing, eventually right next to her, "Mom, I need you to please, please, please answer this truthfully, do you know where Natsu is?"

She quickly glanced at me again before averting her gaze, afraid to look at me, and she gave me the answer that she knew would disappoint me, "No."

I knew she was lying.

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A few hours later, I was relaxing in my room, a few faded streaks of tears still on my face. I didn't push mom to answer my questions about Natsu, I just gave up like always and I hated myself for it. If she was lying there was a reason why. Over the three years since he left, I would incessantly ask her about him, but eventually I stopped, hope just flitting away with each passing day. My friends could never understand why I missed him to that extent, they once even asked me if it was because I was in love with him, to which I just listlessly responded that I didn't see him like that. He was just a friend, the closest friend I ever had, and him just disappearing hurt me in multitudinous ways. It made me wonder if he even cared about me, to just move away like that. It made me doubt our friendship, which had spanned almost a decade. Sure we fought a lot, but there were only two people in this world who could comfort me in the most pacifying way possible, and they were mom and Natsu. Levy, Juvia, Cana, Erza, none of my other friends could ever quite match what Natsu did for me, the affection he would sometimes show.

Either way, I had to learn to move on, and I was doing just well at that until Juvia's comment had reeled me back into this emotional fucking shit!

Fuck this, I needed a way to cheer myself up, and Netflix wasn't going to cut it. Just as I was about to dial Cana's number, I got a text from Juvia saying that she needed my to cover her shift at the local swimming pool; she was a lifeguard. At first I decided to ignore it, but then it got me thinking, what better way to stop being depressed than to relaxing in the sun and looking at cute guys for a few hours? Not that I was looking for a boyfriend but observing never hurt anyone.

I texted her back saying that I would be there in twenty minutes and proceeded to fish my bathing suit out of my closet. It was a one piece that was colored blue with red stripes, nothing fancy seeing as how I was going to be a lifeguard. They would give me a special lanyard once I got there that would designate me as one.

The ride took a few minutes, messing up my hair a little bit, but t was nothing serious. I tucked a few loose curls behind my head and got out of the car. I saw the bathroom off to the right and let me tell you, it was a local legend. The bathroom next to this pool was famous for, well, sex. The amount of people that have fucked in there... holy shit. I almost didn't believe it when Cana first told me about, but I had heard from various other people too. Of course she knew about stuff like that; in fact Juvia and I were the only virgins in our immediate friend group. It wasn't really that embarrassing, but the amount of teasing that was directed towards us did sometimes succeed in reddening our cheeks. It wasn't really a fair contest, most of them had great boyfriends while Cana had recently broken up with hers. Honestly sometimes I thought she was bi but whatever.

I swung open the gate and gazed at the gleaming water that reflected just the right amount of sunlight. I always enjoyed it when the water was so clear that you could see the floor of the pool. I saw the manager close to the concession stand and went to receive my lanyard. Tucking it around my neck, I started climbing the lifeguard's chair, ready for action.

It was a slow day at first, while the weather was perfect for the pool, not that many kids came as usual. There were barely any people my age, a few girls I didn't recognize and one guy I could've sworn was in my math class last year. A flash of familiar blue had me turning my head, wait a second, that was the same girl I had seen earlier today! And... no, holy shit!

Following behind the girl was a boy, he looked around my age, but the strangest part was... he had pink hair! I couldn't make much out of his face seeing as he was on the other side of the pool. All I could see was that he was wearing a t-shirt and black swim trunks. He was talking with the younger girl, moving his hands around a bit in a way that reminded me of someone.

I was a bit numbed at this point, but I slowly started climbing down the ladder back to the cement floor. My feet grazed the ground and almost got scalded instantly, seeing as the sun was really high in the sky now, but I bit the pain down and placed both feet on the floor. For once I obeyed the rules and didn't run along the sides of the pools, scrunching my eyes closer together to see the pink-haired boy better.

The two were still talking while putting on sunscreen, the by had his back to me while the girl was facing me, still talking. As I got closer, my hands clapped over my mouth. The girl was Wendy! Natsu's fucking sister, which meant, that... the boy, was Natsu?!

I saw Wendy's eyes flit over mine for a second before widening in realization. She shook Natsu's and and made him turn around, but I was already running, I don't know why, but I couldn't face him. I hurried into the bathroom and locked myself in on of the stalls. Oh shit, this was the hook-up loo I was stuck in!

I placed the bowl down and sat on it, shock still coursing through my veins like a rat through a maze. My heart was thrumming with a force and I had to wipe my face a little focus. The bathroom had no air conditioning, so sweat was starting to bead everywhere on my skin. I didn't know what the hell to do right now!

A heard the creak open slightly, some natural light pouring in. I heard a sweet voice call out, "Um, excuse me, is someone there?"

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 **Right well this is done, read and review, I always like reading them :)**

 **This chapter is a bit short, but the length will be increasing again, I just really wanted to get this chapter out.**


	30. Sex

**Well I am going to try to write more for this chapter, seeing as how its a momentous situation. Thank you to everyone who read the last chapter! I enjoyed reading the comments, I really missed that.**

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The angelic voice did nothing to calm my nerves. I was fidgeting on the seat of the toilet bowl as I heard the bathroom door close. Hesitant footsteps peppered the floor, getting closer to me. I covered my mouth to try and lessen any noise that might have been emanating from me, yet the steps grew ever closer.

"Excuse me? I'm really sorry about this but, I saw you go in here."

Well great, now I was stuck in this shithole. I didn't know how long Wendy would stay, but I really couldn't face her right now, much less Natsu of all people! I considered telling her to go away, after all Wendy looked like she didn't like confrontation. Some part of my mind was seriously questioning my actions right now. Like, why would I be distancing myself from them after all the time I'd spent wondering about Natsu?

But, this was too soon, and too sudden, he just randomly shows up in front of me at the pool?! No, that was not how a potential reunion was supposed to happen, I wanted a warning at least, so I could prepare myself!

"Again, I'm really sorry to bother you, but if you could just come out for a few minutes? I just have a few questions, please?"

I could hear the desperation in her voice, and it was painful to let those words glide into my ears, so full of sombre melancholy. Fuck me, I really did not want to go out there, but that option was slowly dwindling away like sand in an hourglass, and I seriously doubted that I could get out of this without some form of contact. I stood up and placed a hand against the stall door. The small click of the lock made Wendy stop moving, her steps no longer perceivable.

I opened the door to a weary looking Wendy. Wow, she had really grown now that I got a good look at her. If I remember correctly, she'd be a freshman in high school right now. Her hair was a darker shade of blue than I remember. It was tied back in a ponytail, while she wore a cute one piece. She was shorter than me, but easily average for her age.

She smiled at me, looking a bit mortified at the situation. She began twirling her hand in her hair.

"So, um, this is really embarrassing, but.. you look a lot like an old friend of my cousin's, and well, when you saw us you ran away, so I though-"

"Wendy," I said, moving closer, "It's me, Lucy."

Wendy did a double take, before moving closer as well, "Lucy is that really you?"

I gave a small smile, "Yeah, it's me."

"I-I'm sorry," she choked out, "I really hoped it was you. We didn't know whether any of you would still be in Magnolia when we came back, I-I thought-"

"Shhh, Wendy," I said, "I didn't go anywhere, neither did anyone else. Though we all did wonder where you Natsu had gone."

She pulled back now, a bit of guilt in her eyes, "About that, Lucy, Natsu's really sorry about that, um, perhaps we can go outside and Natsu and I can explain it to you?"

I waved my hands, "Um, no, not yet, I don't think I'm ready to see him yet. Just uhh, tell me in here, we can go out once you're done."

She seemed a bit taken aback at that, but nodded her head in eventual agreement. She began with why Natsu had to move away three years ago. Obviously Igneel had died, but... apparently Wendy's mother was the only possible living situation that was available to Natsu at the time, and Igneel himself had requested that he go to live with them. He had gone to a small town named called Crescentville. When I asked her why I was unable to contact him all these years, she only gulped and looked away. Her voice became a bit shaky, but she basically explained that he had to change cell phone numbers and that the move to a new town was tiring on him.

It didn't seem like a legitimate excuse, she seemed nervous while telling it. It didn't add up, there was no way that Natsu could just fall off the map just by moving to a new town. I decided to let it slide for now.

Wendy went on to talk a little bit about their lives there, activities, school life, friends. She avoided saying anything specifically about Natsu though, and it didn't make sense, maybe she was waiting until he told me himself? Oh god, I still wasn't sure I was ready to face him. I didn't know what to say; hopefully it would come to me when the time came.

Wendy talked a few more minutes, explaining that they had moved back because Wendy's mother had accepted a job at the local hospital. She then asked if I would like to go outside now.

"Sure," I sighed, "I have to ask him a few things."

So out we went, Wendy opening the door and letting me go ahead. I went over to where Natsu was sitting. He had a blue towel over his shoulders, so I could only see a tuft of pink hair. Suddenly, I have no idea what the fuck came over me, but all I could feel was unfathomable anger at the moment, all the pain and hurt that his departure had caused me was finally exploding. All of the lies, the uncertainty, to hell with it all!

He was sitting quite close to the edge of the pool, so in my rage, without thinking I barged into him and shoved him into the pool. He could only yelp in surprise as he was completely submerged.

I stood over the rippling pool, breathing heavily. My fists were balled at my sides and I was ready to berate him to high heaven. I saw him resurface and place his hands on the edge of the pool, pulling himself out.

"Alright Natsu, I am going to talk now, and you are going to lis-" my breath caught in my throat.

I was so stupid, in this entire situation I hadn't taken a proper look at my old friend. He was, _different,_ to say the least. Holy fucking shit, what the hell happened to him. This was not my best friend from three years ago. There was no way. The hair was the same, shaggy and unkempt, but the rest of him was a freaking sex god.

Where was the fat?! It was totally gone, and instead in its place there was an angular face with eyes darker than I remember, he even had a sexy stud in his left ear. There was a scar on the left side of his neck, but now, oh shit! He was taking his fucking shirt off! I suppose he thought there was no point now that it was wet.

I was not ready for what came after that. His biceps and triceps came first, and they were shredded. Not in an overly bulky way, but there was definitely raw strength there. The rest of him was same, I could see a perfect set of abs on him, flexing every time he took a breath. There was no way the was Natsu, it couldn't be!

The boy standing in front of me was the most attractive one I had ever seen! Out of the corner of my eyes I could see the girls from earlier openly gawking at him. It bothered me but I didn't know why.

I was still standing there with my mouth agape. Wendy had reached us by now and was trying hard not to laugh. Natsu shook his head free of water. His wet muscles made me want to lick hi- no bad Lucy! This was my best friend, I couldn't ogle him.

He finally looked my in the eye, and gave a small smile, oh god it was like he trying to seduce me without even trying!

"Guess you haven't changed a bit weirdo."

I couldn't take this anymore; I shoved him back into the pool.

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 **Here is the next chapter, i was feeling inspired so I published it now.**


	31. Why Me?

**Hi, I know its been a little bit, but just know that I still intend to finish this story, and I was thinking, if this story hits 30 reviews in two days, I will try to get the next chapter out within 5 days after this. Read and review please, thank you!**

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The soft rubber of the pool chair had an impression in it the size of my ass, oh wait, it's because I was sitting on it, trying not to ravage my best friend. Were we still best friends? It had been three years, who knew how many friends he had made in Crescentville; maybe he even... dated a few people. Now I was feeling really jealous and I didn't know why, I had never liked Natsu before, but his new feeling clawing at my chest was undeniable. I pushed it far down for the moment and set my eyes on the boy who was giving me heart palpitations.

His soft pink hair was still wet, he was currently drying his body with a towel I had sheepishly given him after I pushed him in the second time. He was grumbling to himself in a cute way while wearing a pout that was making me melt. Wet drops of water cascaded down his cut torso, like mist on glass, I just wanted to wipe it away. Shit, I was such a pervert.

"You're not gonna push me in again right?" Natsu asked, some apprehension still on his grumbling face.

I quickly waved my hands in front of my face, a blush creeping up on my cheeks, "I told you, I told you already, that was a mistake, sorry!"

"If you wanted me to take my shirt off, you should've just asked me Luce," he smirked, wet towel now tousling his hair so that it stuck in every which way; holy shit that wet hair looked sexy as hell on him!

"Wh-who said I wanted to see you without a shirt, don't get so full of yourself." I said, managing to not sound as nervous as I really was.

He gave me a bemused glance, before finishing off the rest of his wet body. If I was going to talk with him, I couldn't be so distracted by his body. As silly as it sounds, I was really attracted to my best friend right now and I needed to concentrate. I was still mad at him but I wasn't acting like it.

"Hey Natsu," I said, he looked at me with a smile, damn that smile, "Maybe you should put your shirt back on, you don't want your skin to get damaged right? It's pretty hot out."

"You sure it's because of the sun?" he chuckled, before putting his shirt back on; oh thank god!

Natsu got comfortable in his chair, wiggling around to properly acclimate himself to the weather. The wind was blowing slightly now, offering a cooling breeze that calmed my nerves a little more.

"So, I know that you're probably mad at me, and I get that." Natsu started

"Natsu I-"

"Let me finish, please," he looked me in the eye, pleading silently; I never could say no to his puppy eyes, whether he was fat or adonis, "I know.. I know that I left kinda suddenly, and that it wasn't fair to you at all. You think I _wanted_ to leave you? The best friend I've ever had? Hell no, and I'm sorry that I left without so much as a goodbye. Igneel had just... passed, and I wasn't really sure what to feel in that moment, I'd never experienced it before, ya know?"

I was sweating nervously in the sun, enraptured by his confession, and the sexy way his biceps flex- shit!

"I really didn't want to leave Magnolia, but I had no other option, I think Wendy probably told you that, but I wanna stress that point, Grandeeney said that I had to come live with her and Wendy, no questions asked, it was in Igneel's will, as well as some other stuff that's not important right now."

"What other stuff?" I breathed out, before I could stop myself.

"Maybe I'll tell you one day," Natsu said, a cheeky grin on his face now.

Oh how that smile made my stomach do flips, I needed to get some fucking control over this new hot Natsu situation or my brain was going to burst into flames.

"Lucy, If you have any other questions, ask them, but just know, that I won't leave you again... that is, if you'll still have me as your friend."

He actually looked doubtful now, a bit of nervousness swirling around in his countenance. Flecks of his hair were matted down, partially hiding his gaze from mine. I almost succumbed to the really strong urge to comb through his hair with my fingers and comfort him, like I used to when we were kids; his hair had always been so _soft._

"Lucy?"

"Of course I do you idiot!" I almost barked, eyes a bit moist, "I've wanted you back in my life the moment you left, nothing can ever change that!"

I was breathing a little harshly now, my chest heaving up and down as I noticed that we were attracting quite a few stares. Before I could drown myself from embarrassment I felt Natsu tugging me into his arms, putting his face in my hair and breathing it in while I wrapped myself around him in a hug I didn't know I desperately needed. Wow, his body was as hard as rock, I might just drool a lit- no bad Lucy!

After a a few minutes, he pulled back, peering into my eyes for confirmation, "Better?"

"Yeah," I said, looking down shyly.

He smiled and then chuckled, shaking his head to let out the last few drips of water that still clung to his hair like moisture on a windowpane.

A small girl who couldn't have been more than 6 or seven was walking towards Natsu. She tugged on his trunks, making him smile down at her.

"Hey, mister? Is that your girlfriend," she asked suddenly, pointing at me, "She's really pretty."

My face was flaming right now and I squawked, "No! We're no-"

Before I could say much else Natsu had reaffirmed his grip on my hip and stood to face the little girl, grinning, "She definitely is pretty, huh?"

The little girl nodded enthusiastically while I slowly died.

"However, she's not my girlfriend, but she is the best friend that I've ever had, ok sweetheart?" he said, now crouching down to her level and bopping her nose once. Sweet shit, that was almost too cute! He had always been good with little kids and now it was downright hot! I mean, no, I shouldn't be thinking about him like this, no Lucy, no!

The little girl ran back to her mother with a laugh and Natsu turned back to me, a pensive look still on his face, "Soooooo, do you wanna hang out or something... or ahhhm?"

He was scratching his head now, eyes averted, looking embarrassed. Why was he so shy? I should be the shy one around him, not the other way around!

Before I could answer, a high-pitched voice sounded out, "Lucyyyyyyy! Is that you?"

"Oh fuck," I muttered under my breath, turning around and praying it wasn't who I thought it was.

No luck, Cana was officially about to ruin me.

Natsu gave me a questioning glance, some amusement behind it, "She's a friend," I said, "I'll be right back.. just, one second."

Cana was smirking at me the whole time as I walked over to her, slowly stewing in my mortification while I got closer.

"Cana, what a surprise. What are you doing here?" I said dryly.

"Can't I just see my favorite busty girl?" Cana asked in mock effrontery, hand over her heart for emphasis, "Juvia said you were working her shift today and I wanted to hang out since Mira's busy. Imagine my surprise when I see you talking to that absolute hunk over there."

Mirajane was Lisanna's older sister, and also Cana's close friend. They were really cute together and had us all wondering whether there was more to it than just platonic friendship.

"Cat got your tongue Lucy? Who is he? I thought you were in your whole, done with boys phase right now," she said, using air quotations for the last part.

"He-he's an old friend, I've told you about him, remember? Natsu?"

She gave Natsu a once over, and then back at me, and then back at him. She took a flask of something, probably liquor, out of her bag and took a sip, and then proceeded to spit it out.

"Wait a second, you mean that's Natsu Dragneel!?" she shrieked, "The one who moved away?! I've seen pictures of him in your house Lucy, there's no way that that's him!"

She glanced at him again, and then, as if just noticing my red face, sauntered closer to me, "Well, well, if it really is him, looks like you had no idea he looked like _that_ now either huh? Has he got your panties all in a twist Lucy? Is he making you all hot and bothered? How badly do you want to touch him?"

"Cana stop, please!" I asked, tugging her arm to emphasize my already steaming face. What really hit home was that Natsu actually was doing all those things to me, and though I was fighting it as hard as I could, I just couldn't seem to kill my attraction to him. What kind of person did that make me? To only start feeling attracted to someone when they suddenly changed in appearance? I didn't want to be like that but my heart was thinking otherwise.

"I think I should go say hi, what do you think Lu?" Cana said, smirking as my eyes grew in fear.

"You wouldn't dare... Cana no!" I said, as the girl started to stroll over to where Natsu was sitting, confusion evident on his face.

As Natsu was about to open his mouth, Cana beat him to the punch, "You're Natsu right? Cana Alberona at your service, and let me just tell you right now that Lucy is down to fuck you anytime, anyplace, its about time she finally gets laid."

"Cana!" I said hotly, following behind her, "What the fuck do you think you're doing?!"

"I'm just letting your friend know how much you like him, right?" she finished, looking back at Natsu who now had a dumbstruck expression on his face, mouth hanging slightly open.

"Sorry, what?" he said, causing Cana to snicker.

"Oh don't mind me, I'll just let you two lovebirds sort it out, I need to tan anyway. See ya later Lucy!"

With that and a wave she shuffled over to a chair and laid down, starting her tan.

"Di-did she just," Natsu started, making me look back at him, "Did she just tell me you were a virgin or am I crazy?"

Oh great, why don't you shout it to the world Cana?

"Ye-yeah, I am a virgin, ahm, I don't really care that you know, but uhm... yeah this is really embarrassing."

"Luce, don't be embarrassed," Natsu said, taking my hands in his, "If it helps feel any better, I am one too."

"You are what too?"

"Come on, don't make me say it, " he said shyly, "I-I'm a you know, a _virgin_."

Now that was hard to believe. The way he was now, Natsu could get any girl he wanted, and I mean literally any girl, he looked like he was right of the pages of a beach-body magazine.

"Thanks for telling me Natsu, you didn't have to," I chuckled; I was actually feeling a little better, almost a sense of relief actually, but I couldn't place the exact reason.

"How much longer do you have to work here?" Natsu said, sitting down in a chair, looking very tired all of a sudden; I would be too in his shoes.

I checked the time, "Maybe another hour or so, do you wanna maybe, hang out at my place after, I know mom would love to see you?"

He searched for Wendy, who was currently playing in the water with a pink-haired girl before answering, "Sounds good, I'll just go for a few laps."

Oh fuck me, now I had to sit up in that accursed chair, watching Natsu swim the whole time, looking at those perfect muscles contract and flex the whole fucking time!

I hate my libido.

* * *

 **Well, here it is, I know its' taken a bit, but hopefully the next chapter can come out sooner than this!**


	32. Hot as Hell

**Well, thank you for the, numerous reviews to update, honestly surprises me a little cuz my writing is not _that_ amazing, but idk. Sorry this took so long, I'm about to graduate and go to college so life has been a little hectic for me atm. If anyone is ever wondering about the status of a chapter release, just PM me and I'll answer.** **Read and** **Review ;)**

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The drive home was excruciatingly cathartic; I had just found my closest friend in the whole world, not to mention he was now fucking sexy as hell, and the effect he was having on me was really peculiar. I'd been around attractive males for the last few years, and nobody made my heart thump like it had back at the swimming pool. I had several guy friends who were all really attractive; Gray, Loke, Jellal, just to name a few, but none of them ever caught my fancy, not one. I had heard that Gray had had a little crush on me when we first met but I was pretty sure it faded away once he met Juvia. I've never seen him in a romantic light in the first place.

No, what Natsu was making me feeling was quite different than what I was used to. I'll admit, I do have a little crush on him now after reuniting with him, but that's all it has to be! Just a crush, nothing more, because I honestly didn't deserve him, not now, not ever, and not like this. He'll have girls crawling all over him once he starts going to school, and the thought of it really pisses me off.

I found my mom at home, in the drawing room, lazily flicking a tablet. She looked at up when I entered.

"Oh Lucy, you're here. Listen, I need you to tun a few errands for me, do you think you can take my car and fill it?"

"Ummm, mom, there's something I have to tell you," I said, sitting down next to her.

She moved closer to me, putting an arm around my shoulders, "What is it sweetheart?", her face morphing into a frown as she tucked a lock of stray hair behind my ear.

I took a deep breath, "I saw... Natsu today, and... after our conversation, seeing him so suddenly, it's actually kind of freaking me out."

My mother's face flitted to shock for a millisecond before switching to mild surprise, "Natsu, really? Well, it's been three years hasn't it. You should invite him over dear, I'd like to say hello."

As my mother gave me an inviting smile, I couldn't help but feel that, yet again, she was hiding something from me. At this point, I don't really care about that, my best friend was coming over in an hour and my hair was a fucking mess!

* * *

The sun was peeking from behind eastern clouds, casting scattering rays in through our broad windows on the front of the house. I was nervously twisting my hair in my hands, hoping to whatever deity there was that I hadn't overdone it. I was sporting a pair of black jeans with a tight, aquamarine turtleneck sweater. I don't wanna brag, but I knew I had a body on me, one of the only good things to come out of that hellish lacrosse training. The amount of times guys tried to grab my ass at parties was honestly too high to count, but I usually just flipped them the bird and gave them a good kick to the stomach.

The doorbell rang and I could almost feel bullets of sweat fall down my cheeks. I swear, even if Natsu showed up in rags, I'd still want to jump his bones!

I rushed to the door and pried it open, with a little too much force because it cracked against the wall and made a resounding clap that was echoed across the surrounding vista. There stood a surprisingly shy looking Natsu, two in, mouth hiding behind that perpetual scarf of his. He was wearing a red long-sleeved cotton shirt that said "crash" on it, accompanied with dark jeans. In other words he looked hot as fucking hell and I really wanted to pull him closer and- no shit, I gotta stop!

Wendy popped from behind him, wearing a pretty green frock, "Hi Lucy, your house is beautiful! Sorry we're a bit late, Natsu lost the keys back at the house."

Natsu mumbled something about stupid keyrings and pouted, looking adorable.

He turned to me, "I didn't really lose them, I just sorta forgot where they were, which happened to be in the car already."

I laughed and tugged on his arm to pull him inside, which had him standing right next to me for a moment. He definitely grew in three years. I used to be slightly taller than him, but now he was maybe an inch or two taller than me. I didn't really like it when a guy towered over me, Natsu's height was perfect... for a friend hahaha, nothing else I fucking swear!

"Wow, the walls didn't use to be blue Luce!" Natsu said as he got a closer look at the interior renovations we had made a year ago, the wall now a light blue instead of grey.

"Yep, mom figured the place looked too gloomy with all the grey."

Natsu turned back to me, "Did you change your room's walls too?"

Mine were pink back then, and we hadn't changed them because they reminded me of this gem of a boy in front of me.

"They're still pink Natsu, we couldn't change that now could we?"

Wendy was of to the side looking at some paintings on the wall, "Lucy, could I look around some? I think Natsu would probably like to talk to you alone anyway," she said while giving me a conspiratorial wink.

I fought off a blush and took it in stride, "Sure, Natsu come on, we've got a lot to talk about."

He followed after me, looking a bit uncertain, "Are you still mad at me? Anything you want me to do, name it, I'll even jump out your window."

"Nothing that dramatic," I laughed, "Look, I get why you had to leave alright? It might not make me happy but, it's not like you had another chance right?"

He nodded no, tugging lightly on his pink locks; I really wanted to touch them toooooo.

"Good then," I said with a jerk of my head towards my room, "Still remember the way?"

"How could I not, we practically used to live in your room," Natsu said bracingly, as he walked ahead of me into my room.

I followed him and got to witness his eyes go wide before he body slammed my bed, "I love this bed so much!"

I giggled at his silliness, glad that there were some parts of him that had never changed. I settled down on the edge of the bed, nervously wringing my hands together in my lap.

Natsu looked at me from underneath his hair which had draped over his eyes, "Soooo, you had questions huh?"

"What?" I said, then regained my composure, "Oh yeah, start from the top, and I mean everything. Like, how did, did all of this, happen," I asked, randomly gesturing towards his stomach, looking away with a blush.

"What do you mean all of this?" Natsu said, then something dawned on him and he grinned, "Oh, you meant why I'm not a fatass anymore?"

"Natsu! Don't call yourself a fatass, you never were one!" I said hotly.

He gave me an incredulous look, "Luce come on, you gotta admit I was."

"Whatever, I'm not gonna call my best friend a fatass," I said, crossing my arms and looking away in a pout.

Natsu sat up and flicked my head.

"Hey!"

"Pipe down Luce, I'll tell you everything, alright?" Natsu said, giving me a wink.

I didn't say anything, I was too busy internally combusting from that cheeky wink and now I was lost in the forest green of his eyes.

* * *

 **Sorry, this is short, I'm still very busy with graduation stuffs, but i have not abandoned this story! at least not yet ;)**

 **If you review in the next week, I will pm you a** **sneak peek of the next chapter, so read and review!**


	33. Rising Danger

**So sorry this is so late, I've been on vacation since I graduated, and then I had to do a soccer tournament stuff for a week, and then I got stuck by and idea for a story and I've been working on that too, but here it is.**

 **If any of you are on Tumblr, gimme a follow, my username is incorrect-ft-mangacaps**

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Shadows lined a dark corridor that seemed to be made completely from clay, grooves stretching and twisting on the walls, as if carved by ancients. Slow, uneasy steps made their way down the hall, as if the owner was afraid to die. The creaking of a door could be heard as it was rushed forward, opened and closed without a second thought.

"What is it? I thought I instructed that no one should bother me?" a high voice said, piercing the darkness as if it was tangible.

"We thought you would want to know this," a hush voice said, "They found the boy, your brother, it seems... he's gone back to his roots."

Nothing but darkness could be heard, and then, if one listened closely, closer than the sound of the wind, they could almost hear the absolute malice coming from the man enshrouded in darkness, his wicked grin forming and transforming his face into that of a demon.

"Our reunion awaits... Natsu."

* * *

"So, let me get this straight," I said, a hand on my hip as I gave Natsu the most incredulous look I could muster, "You joined a pilates class, and lost a bunch of weight?"

"Come on, I wouldn't lie to you right?" Natsu said, not meeting my gaze, letting me know that something was up, "It wasn't just pilates, I played a lot of soccer as well, I was actually thinking of trying out for the school this year."

Honestly, I was expecting some epic saga about hard hours at the gym and protein shakes, but no, Mr. Suddenly Hot just took a fucking pilates class and kicked a ball around! Well isn't that convenient!

"Alright, you don't have to to tell me if you don't want to jerk."

I got up to leave for the door, but before I could even make it two steps Natsu had sprung up and hugged me from behind me, "Lucy, I swear to god that I am telling you the truth, you are the very last person on this earth that I would lie to okay?"

I nodded slowly, my eyes closed, I only wish now that I hadn't believed him back then.

* * *

We talked for hours, it was like I finally had my best friend back, he fit the missing hole in my life that I didn't even know existed. He told me about all of his adventures in his old home, the pitch of his voice was a bit higher when telling some of the stories, but I paid it no mind, it's not like he was lying to me right?

Wendy came into my room later and joined in on the conversation. We must have been up there for hours, because mama called us down to dinner before I even realized it was already 8:30. As I predicted, she gave Natsu a big hug when she saw him, and I was happy. I didn't even notice the way her eyes didn't have the same warmth as her smile.

I was glas Natsu's eating habits hadn't changed, because he was still as wolfish as ever. I wondered how he was able to get so fit while retaining his monstrous appetite; good genes I guess. Natsu and Wendy left a little after ten, bidding me farewell. Natsu patted my neck at door, covering me in goosebumps and making my stomach feel light.

"Natsu, don't do that!" I insisted, straightening my hair out, "I need my hair fine for school tomorrow."

"Oh yeah, today's Sunday," Natsu exclaimed, "Guess we'll see each other tomorrow huh?"

"I hope we do," I said, smiling slightly.

He waved goodbye and I closed the door, slumping with my back against the door and calming my heart. I almost squealed, but that would've made me feel like an even bigger loser. Instead, I stalked up the stairs to cover my face with a pillow; tomorrow was a big day.

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 **Im so sorry its not that long, I'm currently on vacation so we're doing stuff and its hard to write in these small slots of time**


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